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SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



BY 

GrEOKGrE COMBE. 



"Impiety clears the soul of its consecrated errors, but it does not fill the heart 
of man. Impiety alone will never ruin a human worship. A faith destroyed must 
he replaced by a faith. It is not given to irreligion to destroy a religion on earth. 
It is but a religion more enlightened which can really triumph over a religion 
fallen into contempt by replacing it. The earth cannot remain without an altar, 
and God only is strong enough against God 1 " — Lamabtixe's History of the 
Girondists (Vol. I., p. 16 ; Bohn, 1848). 



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PREFACE. 



The nucleus of this work was a pamphlet published by 
■George Combe in April. 1847, with the title "On the 
Relation between Religion and Science." A second 
edition was issued a few months later, and the entire 
essay was reproduced in the Phrenological Journal for 
July of the same year. 

The publication brought on the author, with renewed 
virulence, the charges of irreverence and atheism to which 
he had been subjected for nearly thirty years. Referring 
to these attacks, he said : " ZST o religious martyr ever 
held his faith more purely and firmly than I hold my 
own convictions. . . . Like the veteran soldier who 
has escaped unhurt from fifty battles, I hear the can- 
nonade of passion and prejudice with a feeling that it 
cannot reach me." 

To the charge that he had subordinated Scripture 
to the law of Nature, he replied in a letter to Mrs. 
Whately : " I have not said that Scripture is derived 
from natural religion, but only that its practical pre- 
cepts regarding human conduct in this world must be 
supported by the order of Nature, otherwise that they 
cannot produce practical fruits. But natural religion 
appears to me to be derived from Nature, and not from 
Scripture." 

Going on to explain his general position, he says, in 
the same letter : " I regard the external world as 
designedly adapted by God to the human mind and 
body, and as containing within itself (by this Divine 
appointment) objects and relations addressed to, and 
intended + -o arouse, excite, and gratify, all our faculties. 



vi 



PREFACE. 



In short, I recognise God — His adaptations in every- 
thing animate and inanimate ; I feel myself constantly 
in His presence, and every moment under the control 
and discipline of His laws. Revelation may present 
higher objects than Nature to our faculties, but Nature 
does appear to me to address them all. 

4 'By you, perhaps, similar views are entertained, 
but I go a step further. I do not regard all the Divine 
adaptations unfolded to us through Causality and Com- 
parison as intended merely to excite a devout Wonder 
and Veneration, without leading us to do anything prac- 
tically. On the contrary, I see practical lessons em- 
bodied in every one of God's natural institutions." 

George Combe's cardinal doctrine thus w T as that God 
had revealed Himself in Nature as well as in Scripture ; 
that the one revelation was as instructive in its facts, 
and as binding in its lessons, as the other ; and that the 
two revelations are in entire harmony, except when 
God's message is perverted by man-made creeds. 

The pamphlet of 1847 grew under his hand until, in 
1857, it assumed the dimensions of a volume. 

That volume was affectionately inscribed to his 
friend Dr. Charles Mackay, in token of " A friendship 
of long duration, admiration of your genius, and cordiaJ 
sympathy with the purposes to which you have devoted 
it." 

In a letter to Mr. Benjamin Templar in 1858, George 
Combe wrote regarding this work : " I consider it the 
most original, and, in its distant results, the most im- 
portant of all my productions \ but this may be, like a 
parent's love of his youngest child, because it is mv 
last/' 



Edinburgh. October, 1893. 



CONTENTS, 



CHAPTER I. 

AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 

PACrH 

Effect of the Eef ormation . . . . . . . .1 

Belief in God's special intervention , . . . . 2- 

And in that of the Devil 4 

Founded in Judaism ......... 5 

Providence rules by general laws in the physical world . . 7 
Also in the moral world ......... 8 

Divine authority of the Natural Laws .... = . 9 

Ignored by the Churches . . . . . . - .10 

And by Politicians 11 

Views of Archbishop Whately . . , , . . .12 
Lord Palmerston and the Edinburgh Presbytery . . . .13 

A second Reformation needed ........ 15 

Views of Caiiyle and Chalmers . . . , . . .16 

View of Dr. Tholuck , . .17 

Need of reconciling Science and Religion . . . . .19 

CHAPTER II. 

THE COMPLEX CHARACTER OF RELIGION. 

Definition of Science and of Religion ...... 20 

Religion partly emotional, partly intellectual . . . .21 

The meaning of Consecration . 22 

What Theology means . 23 

Difference between Theology and Religion ..... 23 

Warp and Woof 2±- 

Nature not recognised as sacred . . . . . . .23 

Is a Natural Theology possible ? . . . , . . .27 

CHAPTER III. 

OF GOD. 

Origin of the idea of God 29 

Among the Greeks and the Romans ...... 29 

Among the Jews .......... 30 

The Mahommedan idea 31 

The Christian idea . . . . , . . . . .33 



Yin CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

The Roman Catholic interpretation ...... 34 

The Reformers' interpretation . . . , . , .35 

Origin of dogma , . .36 

Ideas of God derived from Nature . . . - . . .37 
Belief in God intuitive or rational ...... 38 

The province of Reason . 40—- 

The adaptations in Nature not accidental 41 

Reply to the Atheist's argument 43 

Objection to the argument from Design . . r , .44 

Answered 45 

The mode of God's existence inscrutable .... 47 

CHAPTER IV. 

THE GOVERNMENT OF THE PHYSICAL AND MORAL WORLDS. 

I. TJie Government of the Physical World . . ' . .50 

The regulation of the forces of Nature 51 

The physical sciences manifestations of Divine power . . .52 

II. The Government of the Moral World . .... 53 

Evidences of law and order in the lower animals . . . .54 

Ignored by dogmatic religion . . . . . .55 

What the moral government of the world means . , . .56 
Absence of its practical recognition . ■ e , , .57 

Ignorance of Natural Laws the grand obstacle . . * .59 

CHAPTER V. 

LIFE AND DEATH. 

The Christian dogma of Death . . 60 

Death, according to Science, a natural institution . „ .61 

The grand evils of Death 62 

Death a beneficent institution . . . . . . .64 

Relations of Life and Death to the natural Constitution of Man . 65 
How the duration of Life may be extended . . . . .65 

tJiiiformity of the death-rate ,66 

Is it Fatalism, or Causation ? . . . . , , .67 
Example : the sense of Hearing ....... 68 

Vindication of God's secular providence 69 

Knowledge of the Natural Laws, Divine truth . . . .70 
Suffering for their infraction pre-ordained by God . . .71 
That suffering may be avoided by knowledge and forethought . 72 

Testimony of the records of mortality 73 

Sir James Simpson's Tables . . . . , , . * . 74 

The effects of foul air 75 

The voice of Nature ; that is, of God ...... 76 

The prison versus the hospital . , ,77 

The cry of Infidelity . 78 

Case of Exeter and Tiverton 79 
Appeal to the lower faculties ... .... 80 

Longevit}' and Happiness , . ./ t n t .81 



CONTENTS, ix 
CHAPTER VI 

MOEAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 

PAGE. 

Are the Bible precepts as to justice and mercy practical ? .83 

The Case of England and Ireland 8-1 

Disbelief in Moral Government on the part of iuler? . . , 85 
Results of England's misgovernment of Ireland . . .87 

Eree Trade a triumph of moral force SS 

Superiority of Moral to Physical Force 90 

The Case of England and India 91 

Inconsistency of national spoliation with Christianity . . . 92 
England's Indian policy a mistake ...... 

Benevolent conquest a pretence 95 
Proofs of a moral government by Natural Laws . . . .97 



CHAPTER TIL 

THE WOELD AX INSTITUTION. 

What is an Institution ? , .9^ 

Example : The Planetarv Svstem 99 

„ The Ocean 100 

„ Natural History . . . . . = 6 .101 

,, Geology ......... 101 

The Human Constitution . . . . . . 103 

Original Sin and Anaesthetics 10-i 

Pain and Disease, not essential parts of the Institution. . .104 
Adaptation in Physical Nature . . . . . . .105 

The doctrine of the Church of Scotland 107 

Opposed to the view that the world is an Institution . , . 110 
The Catechism inconsistent with the order of Nature . » .112 



CHAPTER VHI. 

THE SACEEDXESS OF NATURE. 

Rejection of the laws of Providence, practical atheism c .114 

Labour not a curse, but a boon 116 

The objection from suffering, futile .117 

Provisions in Nature for the mitigation of suffering . . .118 

Decline of parental love, benevolent 119 

Decline of the fear of Death , 120 

The Benevolence of Natural Law 121 

Necessity of correct views of God and His government. . .122 

Conditions of our knowledge of God 124 

The difference between Obeying and Comprehending . . . 125 
Service of the Shaking Quakers in America . . . . .120 
Compared with Roman Catholic ceremonies . . . , .128 
What worship accords with the human faculties ? . . . 129 
The relation of Nature to the religious emotions . . . .130 



x CONTENTS, 

PAGK 

Aim of the religions emotions . . . , «. . .131 

Impressions modified by mental constitution » , ► .13*2 
Basis of religion and morality in Nature c » 133 

CHAPTER IX. 

RKLIGMOTJS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 

Meaning of Discipline ......... 134 

Every line of eondnct must be moral ...... 135 

Doubtful condemnation of Mammonism ..... 136 

Eeal cause of the evils of -wealth 133 

^Vhat is the Higher Life .139 

Harmony between the intellectual and the moral faculties and 

the Institutions of God 141 

Eesult of severing religion from the laws of Xature . . . 144 

Distinctive character of Christianity 145 

Its disadvantages • . • . 146 

CHAPTER X. 

THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 

Differences among Christians . . . . . . .143 

Xo system of doctrines in the Bible . . . .' . 149 

Influences undennining Christianity 150 

Dogma an obstacle to social progress ...... 151 

Doctrines of the Fall and the Atonement . . . . .152 

Origin of Moral Evil, according to Natural Law . . . .152 

Abuses of the Christian doctrines 153 

Case of the penitent felon . . . ; ... 154 
Dogma powerless against crime ....... 156 

The Papal power opposed to liberty and improvement . . .157 
The power of Protestantism not less injurious . . . .158 

Opposition of the Clergy to the Divine order of Xature . .159 

How dogma supports despotism 160 

Why tyranny is impossible in England . . . . .161 
Potency of the moral government of the World . , . .162 

CHAPTER XI. 

CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 

The doctrine of Heaven and Hell an instrument of power . . 165 

The authority of the letter of Scripture 166 

The distinction between conviction and belief . . . .167 
Two sources of Belief — intuition and testimony . . . .168 

Man-concocted articles of faith . 169 

The motive of the Clergy 171 

Origin of the belief in eternal punishment 172 

Conviction dependent on Divine manifestations in Xature . .174 
Belief dependent on Clerical interpretations 174 



CONTEXTS. xi 

PAGE 

Dogmatic religion makes the Clergy a separate class . . .175 

Reformation must begin with the laity 1 76 

No hostile design against Religion . . . . . .177 

Religions founded, on the supernatural . . . . . .179 

Influence of Natural Science with the Hindus .... 180 

Natural Religion potent against superstition .... 182 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 

Obstructive effects of the Dogmas in Legislation . 

The cause of this state of things, the ignoring of Natural Law 

Dogmas of the Emperor of Russia ..... 

The Dogmas obstructive in Education ..... 

The differences of sects inimical to the course of Nature 

The Education Grant . an endowment of discord . 

The torrent of Sectarianism .... ... 

Success of the Non-sectarian System in the United States . 

Failure of the Voluntary System in England 

The Dogmas and the monopoly of Sunday .... 

The Dogmas are the religion of the dogmatists 

CHAPTER XIII. 

CONCLUSION — THE REFORMED FAITH. 



Human Nature the central point of inquiry . . , , .199 
Its relation to the religious faculties . . , , , .199 
The qualities and relations of Natural objects .... 200 
The Laws of Nature are Divine Laws . . . . . .201 

Distinction between Religion and Theology 202 

The Higher Life, under the reformed faith ..... 203 
The future destiny of Alan, under the reformed faith . . . 204 
The Bible no obstacle ......... 205 

Value of Science teaching 205 

Divine government discernible in Nature . . . . .207 

Prince Albert quoted 208 

Realisation of a present Deity 209 

APPENDIX. 

I. On the Worship of the Shakers 211 

II. Heaven and Hell ! 213 

III. Note on Dr. McCosh's "Method of the Divine Govern- 

ment" 216 

IV. Speech of Lord John Russell on Teaching Natural Theology 

in Common Schools ° , 218 

V. The Teaching of Physiology in Common Schools . '. 221 



. 183 
. 184 
. 185 
. 186 
. 188 
. 189 
. 190 
. 192 
. 193 
. 194 
. 197 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION, 



CHAPTER I. 
Ax Historical Retrospect. 

The Reformation in the sixteenth century produced a 
powerful effect on the European mind. The miracles, 
precepts, and sublime devotional effusions of the Old and 
Xew Testaments excited with deep intensity the religious 
sentiments of the people, and introduced ardent discussions 
on temporal and eternal interests which, unfortunately, were 
followed by furious and desolating wars. Freedom on 
earth, and salvation in heaven or perdition in hell, were 
the mighty topics which then engaged public attention. 

In the beginning of the seventeenth century, a genera- 
tion born and educated under these exciting influences 
appeared upon the stage. The Reformation was then 
consummated, but the duty remained of acting it out in 
deeds. The new generation had read in the Books of the Old 
Testament of a people whose King was God ; whose national 
councils were guided by Omniscience ; and whose enter- 
prises, whether in peace or in war, were aided and accom- 
plished by Omnipotence employing means altogether apart 
from the ordinary course of Nature. The Xew Testament 
presented records of a continued exercise of similar super- 
natural powers ; and the great lesson taught in both seemed 
to that generation to be, that the power of God was 

B 



2 



SCIEXCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap, l 



exercised as a shield to protect, and an irresistible influence 
to lead to success and victory in secular affairs, those who 
believed and worshipped aright, who embraced cordially the 
doctrines revealed in the sacred volumes, who abjured all 
self-righteousness and self-reliance, and who threw them- 
selves in perfect confidence and humility on Him as their 
King, Protector, and Avenger. 

In the first half of the seventeenth century the active 
members of society in England and Scotland embraced 
these views as principles not only of faith, but of practice. 
With that earnestness of purpose which is inspired by pro- 
found conviction of religious truth, they desired to realise 
in deeds what they professed as faith. As remarked by 
Thomas Carlyle, that generation " attempted to bring the 
Divine law of the Bible into actual practice in men's affairs 
on the earth." In the contests between Cromwell and the 
Covenanters, we observe both parties claiming to be " the 
people of God " ; both asserting that they are directed by 
Divine influence and supported by Divine power, even 
when in hostile collision with each other. It is necessary 
only to read attentively Cromwell's letters and speeches, 
and the contemporary narratives of the Covenanters, to be 
satisfied of this fact. Each party ascribed its successes 
to the Divine approval of its conduct and belief, and 
its calamities to displeasure with its unbelief or other 
sins. 

When Cromwell overthrew the Scots, and "had the 
execution of them " — in other words, the slaughter of 
them — for many miles in the pursuit, he called it " a sweet 
mercy " vouchsafed to him by God, to whom he devoutly 
ascribed the glory. After mentioning his victory at 
Dunbar, the trophies of which were about " three thousand 
Scots slain," "near ten thousand prisoners," "the whole 
baggage and train taken," with " all their artillery, great 
and small,'"' he adds, " It is easy to see the Lord hath done 



chap. I.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



3 



tins. It would do you good to see and hear our poor foot 
to go up and down making their boast of God." * 

The Covenanters held the same belief ; but, somewhat 
inconsistently, while they confessed that their own religious 
unworthiness had brought upon them the Divine dis- 
pleasure, they denied to Cromwell the right to interpret the 
victory as a manifestation of the Divine approval of his 
faith, principles, and practice : They endeavoured to repre- 
sent it as merely " an event " ; for which Cromwell 
rebukes them in the following words : — " You (the men 
of the Covenant) say that you have not so learned Christ 
' as to hang the equity of your cause upon events.' We 
(for our part) could wish that blindness had not been cast 
upon your eyes to all those marvellous dispensations 
which God hath lately wrought in England. But did you 
not solemnly appeal (to God) and pray 1 Did not we do so 
too 1 And ought not you and we to think, with fear and 
trembling, of the hand of the great God in this mighty and 
strange appearance of His, instead of slightly calling it an 
event ] Were not both your and our expectations renewed 
from time to time whilst we waited upon God, to see which 
way He would manifest Himself upon our appeals ? And 
shall we, after all these our prayers, fastings, tears, expecta- 
tions, and solemn appeals, call these bare events 1 The Lord 
pity you ! "f 

While the people of that age entertained these views of 
the manner of Gods administration of secular affairs, they 

* Letter XCII., Cromwell to Lenthal, dated Dunbar. 4th Septem- 
ber, 1650; " Carlyle's Cromwell,'' Vol. II., p. 41. — [In subsequent 
quotations, the words within single marks of quotation, and within 
parentheses, are inserted by Mr. Carlyle to make Cromwell's meaning 
plainer.— Ed.] 

t Letter XCVIL, Cromwell to the Governor of Edinburgh Castle, 
dated Edinburgh, 12th September, 1650; in « Carlyle," Vol. IL, 
p. 65. 

B 2 



4 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. [chap. i. 



were equally convinced of the supernatural agency of the 
devil, and with similar earnestness acted on this conviction. 
They ascribed their sins to Satanic influence on their minds, 
and attributed to the exercise of Satanic power many of the 
physical evils under which they suffered. They imagined 
that this power was exercised by the devil through the 
instrumentality of human beings, and burned thousands 
of these supposed agents of the fiend, under the name of 
witches. 

This belief lingered among the Scottish people a century 
later. In February, 1743, the Associate Presbytery of the 
Secession Church passed an "'Act for Renewing the National 
Covenant " ; and among other national sins which they 
confessed and vowed to renounce is mentioned ''the repeal 
of the penal statutes against witchcraft, contrary to the 
express laws of God, and for which a holy God may be 
provoked, in a way of righteous judgment, to leave those 
who are already ensnared to be hardened more and more, 
and to permit Satan to tempt and seduce others to the same 
wicked and dangerous snare." 

These were the views of God's providence entertained by 
the religious men of the seventeenth century. Those who 
were not penetrated by a deep sentiment of religion acted 
then, as the same class does now, on the views of the order 
of Nature with which their own experience and observation, 
aided by those of others, had supplied them. They did not 
trouble themselves with much inquiry whether this order 
was systematic or incidental, moral or irrespective of moral- 
ity, but they acted as their views of expediency dictated at 
the moment. It is with the opinions of the religious and 
earnest men of that century that we are now principally 
engaged. 

In commenting on that period, Thomas Carlyle observes, 
in his own quaint style, that " the nobility and gentry of 
England were then a very strange body of men. The 



chap, i.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



5 



English squire of the seventeenth century clearly appears 
to have believed in God, not as a figure of speech, hut as a 
very fact, very awful to the heart of the English squire/' 
He adds : " We have wandered far away from the ideas 
which guided us in that century, and, indeed, which had 
guided us in all preceding centuries, but of which that 
century was the ultimate manifestation. We have wandered 
very far, and must endeavour to return and connect our- 
selves therewith again/ 3 >;< 

I ask, How shall we return ! This is a grave question, 
and the answer demands serious consideration. 

The grand characteristic of the Jewish dispensation, on 
which chiefly these views of the Divine government of the 
world were founded, was that it was special and super- 
natural. In the seventeenth century the people possessed 
very little scientific knowledge of the elements, agencies, 
and laws of inorganic and organic Nature. The Scriptures 
constituted almost the sole storehouse of deep reflection 
and profound emotion for that age ; and, in the absence of 
scientific knowledge, thoughtful men fell naturally into the 
belief that, as the Scriptures were given for guides to 
human conduct, the same scheme of Providence, physical 
and moral, which had prevailed in ancient Jewish times 
must still continue in force. Their conviction on this point 
appears to have been profound and genuine, and they 
attempted to act it out in deeds. 

But was there no error of apprehension here ? Were 
they not mistaken in believing that the course of Provi- 
dence was the same in their day as it is described to have 
been among the ancient Jews ? A brief consideration of 
their actions, and the results of them, may help us to answer 
the question. 



* Lib. cit,, Vol. L, pp. 3 and 87. 



6 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap, l 



They assumed that the supernatural agencies which 
Scripture told them had been manifested under the Jewish 
disj ensation might still be evoked, and would, in some form 
or other, be exerted for their guidance and support, if they 
appealed to God, and called for them in a right spirit. 
Hence, instead of studying and conforming to the laws of 
Nature, they resorted to fastings, humiliations, praise, and 
prayers, as practical means not only of gaining battles and 
establishing political power, but of obtaining Divine direc- 
tion in all the serious affairs of life. Their theology and their 
science, so far as they had any science, were in harmony. 
They did not recognise an established and regular order of 
Nature as the means through which God governs the world, 
and to which He requires man to adapt his conduct ; 
but they regarded every element of physical nature and every 
faculty of the human mind as under the administration of 
a special and supernatural Providence. They viewed God 
as wielding all these elements arbitrarily, according to His 
will ; and or that will they believed they could operate by 
religious faith and observances. 

In principle, their view of the nature of the Divine 
administration of the world was similar to that entertained 
by the Greeks and Romans. Homer's priests and heroes 
offered supplications to the gods for direct interference in 
favour of their schemes, and their prayers are represented 
to have been occasionally successful in bringing super- 
natural aid. Cromwell, and the men of his age, with more 
true and exalted conceptions of God, believed in His 
still administering the affairs of men, not by means of a 
regular order of causes and effects, but by direct exercises of 
special power. 

I should say that in this condition of mind they were 
inspired by pure and exalted religious emotions, but misled 
by great errors in theology. It was under the influence of 
such views of the Divine administration that the existing 



chap, i.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



7 



standards of the Church of England and of the Presby- 
terian Church of Scotland were framed • and hence perhaps 
arose the very meagre recognition of the order of God's 
providence in the course of Nature as religious truth, and 
as a system of practical instruction for the guidance of 
human conduct, which characterises them. 

After the days of Cromwell, however, the human under- 
standing, by a profounder and more exact study of Nature, 
obtained a different view of the course of Providence in the 
administration of temporal affairs. Science revealed a 
system in which every object, animate or inanimate, appears 
to be endowed with peculiar qualities and powers, which it 
preserves and exerts with undeviating regularity as long as 
its circumstances continue unchanged ; and in which each 
object is adapted with wisdom and benevolence to the 
others, and all to man. In the words of the Rev. Mr. 
Sedgwick, science unfolded a fixed order of creation so 
clear and intelligible that " we are justified in saying that 
in the moral as in the physical world, God seems to govern 
by general laws.*' — "I am not now," says he, "contending 
for the doctrine of moral necessity • but I do affirm that 
the moral government of God is by general laws, and that 
it is our bounden duty to study those laws, and, as far as ive 
can, turn them to our account.''* 

Here, then, an important revolution has been effected 
in the views of profound thinkers in regard to the mode in 
which Providence administers this world. Science has 
banished from their minds belief in the exercise by the 
Deity, in our day, of special acts of supernatural power as 
a means of influencing human affairs ; and it has presented 
a systematic order of Nature, which man may study, 
comprehend, and follow as a guide to his practical conduct. 

* "Discourse on the Studies of the University" (of Cambridge). 
By Adam Sedgwick, M.A., 3rd edition, p. 9. 



s 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. I. 



In point of fact, the new faith has already partially taken 
the place of the old. In everything physical, men now act 
on the belief that this world's administration is conducted 
on the principle of an established order of Nature, in which 
objects and agencies are presented to man for his study, 
are to some extent placed under his control, and are wisely 
calculated to promote his instruction and enjoyment. 

Some persons adopt the same view in regard even to 
moral affairs. The creed of the modern man of science is 
well expressed by Mr. Sedgwick in the following words :— 
" If there be a superintending Providence, and if His will 
be manifested by general laws, operating both on the 
physical and moral world, then must a violation of these 
laws be a violation of His toil I, and be pregnant with inevi- 
table misery. Nothing can, in the end, be expedient for 
man, except it be subordinate to those laivs the Author of 
Nature has thought jit to impress on His moral and physical 
creation^ Other clergymen also embrace the same view. 
The Rev. Dr. Thomas Guthrie, in his "Plea for Ragged 
Schools," observes that "They commit a grave mistake 
who forget that injury as inevitably results from flying in 
the face of a moral or mental as of a physical law." 

This revolution in practical belief, however, is only 
partial ; and the great characteristic of the religious mind 
at the present day is its aversion to the doctrine of an 
intelligible, moral, and practical system of government, 
revealed by God to man in the order of Nature for the 
guidance of his conduct, and that correct expositions of this 
system possess the character of religious truths. This un- 
belief in an intelligible and practically useful Divine govern- 
ment in Nature affects our religion, our literature, and our 
conduct. I put the following questions in all earnestness :— 
Are the fertility of the soil, the health of the body, the 
prosperity of individuals and of nations — in short, the great 
secular interests of mankind — now governed by special acts 



CHAP, i.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 9 

of supernatural power ? Science answers that they are not. 
Are they, then, governed by any regular and comprehensible 
natural laws ! If they are not. then is this world a theatre 
of anarchy, and consequently of atheism ; it is a world 
without the practical manifestation of a god. 

If* on the other hand, such laws exist as science pro- 
claims, they must be of Divine institution, and worthy of 
all reverence ; and I ask. in the standards of what Church, 
from the pulpits of what sect, and in the schools of 
what denomination of Christians, are these laws taught 
as religious truths of Divine authority, and as practical 
guides for conduct in this world's affairs ] If we do not 
now live under a special supernatural government of the 
world, but under a government by natural laws, and if these 
laws are not studied, honoured, and obeyed as God's laws, 
are we not actually a nation without a religion in harmony 
with the true order of Providence, and therefore without a 
religion adapted to practical purposes \ 

The answer will probably be that this argument is infi- 
delity ; but. with all deference. I reply that the denial of a 
regular, intelligible, wisely adapted, and Divinely appointed 
order of Nature, as a guide to human conduct in this world, 
is practical atheism : while the acknowledgment of the 
existence of such an order, accompanied by the nearly uni- 
versal neglect of teaching and obeying its requirements, is 
real infidelity, is disrespectful to God, and injurious to 
the best interests of man. Christians cannot consistently 
believe that God answers the prayers of Mahommedans, 
Hindus, Persians, and Chinese, lor they deny the sound- 
ness of their faiths ; nor that He exercises a special provi- 
dence for their guidance to temporal prosperity, and for 
their consolation in affliction and in the hour of death : and 
yet. if God really governs the world, His laws must apply to 
these nations as well as to Christians. 

The Churches which have at ail recognised the order of 



10 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. I. 



Nature have attached to it a lower character than that 
which truly belongs to it. They do not recognise it as 
religious : i.e., as an administration of Divine origin, 
deserving of reverential obedience. They have treated 
science and secular knowledge chiefly as objects of 
curiosity and sources of gain, and have given to actions 
intelligently founded on them the character of prudence. 
So humble has been their estimate of the importance of 
science, that they have not systematically called in the in- 
fluence of the religious sentiments to hallow, elevate, and 
enforce the teachings of Nature. In most of their schools 
the elucidation of the relations of science to human conduct 
is omitted altogether, and catechisms of human invention 
usurp its place. 

Society, meantime, including the Calvinistic world 
itself, proceeds in its secular enterprises on the basis of 
natural science, so far as it has been able to discover it. 
If practical men send a ship to sea, they endeavour to 
render it staunch and strong, and to place in it an expert 
crew and an able commander, as conditions of safety, 
dictated by their conviction of the order of Nature in flood 
and storm ; if they are sick, they resort to a physician to 
restore them to health according to the ordinary laws of 
organisation ; if they suffer famine from wet seasons, they 
drain their lands ; and so forth. All these practices and 
observances are taught and enforced by men of science and 
the secular press as measures of practical prudence ; but 
few Churches recognise the order of Nature, on which they 
are founded, as an object of reverence, and a becoming 
subject of religious instruction. 

On the contrary, from the days of Galileo to the present 
time, religious professors have too often made war on 
science, on scientific teachers, and on the order of Nature ; 
and many of them still adhere, as far as the reason and 
light of the public mind will permit them, to their old 



chap. I.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



11 



doctrine of an inherent disorder reigning in the natural 
world. That disorder prevails is undeniable \ but science 
proclaims that it is to a great extent owing to man's igno- 
rance of his own nature and of that of the external world, 
and to his neglect of their relations. 

Many theologians do not recognise such views, but 
proceed as if human affairs were, somehow or other, still, 
in our day, influenced by special manifestations of Divine 
power. In Parliament, it was said by Mr. Plumptre, while 
discussing the famine in Ireland in 1846-7 through the 
failure of the potato crop, that '''though he did not mean to 
enter at large into the question where the guilt which had 
drawn down upon them this tremendous dispensation lay 
—whether that guilt lay with the people or the rulers — he 
could not help expressing what he considered to be a well- 
founded opinion, that the rulers of this country had deeply 
offended by some Acts which they had recently placed on 
the statute-book, and which, in his belief, were calculated 
to bring down the Divine displeasure on the land." 

It is conjectured that this honourable gentleman had in 
view the grant to the Roman Catholic College of Maynooth 
and the repeal of the corn-laws as the offences which, in 
his opinion, were calculated to bring down the Divine dis- 
pleasure on the land. Be the acts what they may, the 
speech implied that, in his opinion, sin in the people or in 
their rulers had led to a special deflection of physical 
nature from its ordinary course, in order to produce a 
famine, for the punishment, not of the offenders, but of 
men, women, and children promiscuously, most of whom 
had no control over the transactions. 

These notions would be unworthy of notice were it not 
a fact that they are still embraced as religion by large 
numbers of our people. In the olden time, eclipses were 
viewed as portentous announcements of Heaven's wrath 
against sinners ; but the discovery of unswerving physical 



12 



SCIEXCE AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. I. 



laws, by which the motions of the heavenly bodies are 
regulateil, and in virtue of which the certain occurrence of 
eclipses can be predicted; has expunged that superstition 
from the civilised mind. Nevertheless, the same blind love 
of the wonderful and the mysterious, which led our ancestors 
to quail before a natural and normal obscuration of the 
sun, leads the unenlightened mind in our day to see in sin 
the causes of such visitations as cholera and agricultural 
blights, instead of looking for them in physical conditions 
presented to our understandings as problems to be solved, 
and to be then turned to account in avoiding future evils. 
Examples are frequently occurring of this conflict between 
the views of men who acknowledge a practical natural 
providence and those who do not. 

Archbishop Whately, in his ' ; Address to the Clergy and 
other Members of the Established Church on the Use and 
Abuse of the Present Occasion " ^the famine in Ireland in 
1846-47), says :— 

" But advantage has been taken of the existing calamity to 
inculcate, with a view to the conversion of persons whom I believe 
to be in error, doctrines which I cannot but think utterly unsound, 
and of dangerous tendency, by arguments which will not stand 
the test of calm and rational examination. There are some who 
represent the present famine (as indeed they did the cholera some 
years back) as a Divine judgment, sent for the punishment of what 
they designate as national sins, especially the degree of toleration 
and favour shown to the members of the Church of Rome. "Now, 
this procedure, the attributing to such and such causes the sup- 
posed Divine wrath, is likely, when those of a different creed from 
our own are thus addressed, to be by some of them rejected as 
profane presumption, and by others retorted. When once men 
begin to take- upon them the office of inspired prophets, and to 
pronounce boldly what are the counsels of the Most High, it is as 
easy to do this on the one side as on the other. Eoman Catholics 
who are told that a pestilence or a famine is sent as a judgment 
on the land for the toleration of Romanism may contend that, on 



chap, i.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



13 



the contrary, it is Protestantism that is the national sin. And 
without the evidence of a sensible miracle to appeal to, neither 
party can expect to convince the other. 

" When Israel was afflicted with a famine in the days of 
Elijah, on account of the idolatry of those of the people who had 
offended the Lord by worshipping Baal, the idolaters might have 
contended that the judgment was sent by Baal against the wor- 
shippers of Jehovah, had not the prophet expressly denounced that 
judgment beforehand, and foretold both the commencement, and 
afterwards the termination, of the drought, besides calling down 
the fire from heaven upon the altar. This it is that enables us to 
pronounce that that famine was a Divine judgment sent for the 
sin of Israel; and for what sin ! And it is the same with the many 
similar cases that are recorded in Scripture. That Sodom and 
Gomorrah were destroyed on account of their abominable wicked- 
ness we know, because Scripture tells us so. And that Ananias and 
Sapphira were struck dead for tempting the Spirit of God we 
know, and all present knew, because the Apostle Peter announced 
beforehand their fate, and declared the crime which called it 
down. But for any uninspired man to take upon him to make 
similar declarations respecting any one of his neighbours who may 
die suddenly, or concerning any city that may be destroyed by a 
volcano or an earthquake, is as irrational and presumptuous as it 
is uncharitable and unchristian." 

Another example is contained in a letter addressed by 
Lord Palmerston, as Home Secretary, to the Presbytery of 
Edinburgh, in answer to their inquiry whether he intended 
to advise the Queen to order a day of fasting, humiliation, 
and prayer to be observed in Scotland, in order to suppli- 
cate Divine Providence to stay the cholera which afflicted 
the people in 1854 : — 

"The Maker of the universe has established certain laws of 
Nature for the planet in which we live, and the weal or woo of 
mankind depends upon the observance or the neglect of those 
laws. One of those laws connects health with the absence 
of those gaseous exhalations which proceed from overcrowded 
human beings or from decomposing substances, whether animal or 



14 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. I. 



vegetable ; and those same laws render sickness the almost inevitable 
consequence of exposure to those noxious influences. But it has 
at the same time pleased Providence to place it within the power 
of man to make such arrangements as will prevent or disperse 
such exhalations, so as to render them harmless ; and it is the 
duty of man to attend to those laws of Nature, and to exert 
the faculties which Providence has thus given to man for Ins 
own welfare. 

"The recent visitation of cholera, which has for the moment 
been mercifully checked, is an awful warning given to the people 
of this realm that they have too much neglected their duty in 
this respect, and that those persons with whom it rested to purify 
towns and cities, and to prevent or remove the- causes of disease, 
have not been sufficiently active in regard to such matters. Lord 
Palmerston would, therefore, suggest that the best course which 
the people of this country can pursue to deserve that the further 
progress of the cholera should be stayed will be to employ the 
interval that will elapse between the present time and the be- 
ginning of next spring in planning and executing measures by 
which those portions of their towns and cities which are inhabited 
by the poorest classes, and which, from the nature of things, must 
most need purification and improvement, may be freed from those 
causes and sources of contagion which, if allowed to remain, will 
infallibly breed pestilence, and be fruitful in death, in spite of all 
the prayers and fastings of a united but inactive nation. When 
man has done his utmost for his own safety, then is the time to 
invoke the blessing of Heaven to give effect to his exertions." 

The majority of the Presbytery expressed great dissatis- 
faction with this communication, and refused to acknowledge 
that cleansing the town would be a becoming substitute for 
a day of fasting, humiliation, and prayer, as a means of 
averting cholera. The civic rulers of Edinburgh, however, 
acted on it, and with very beneficial effects ; for the disease 
fell far more lightly on the city on this occasion than at the 
previous visitation in 1831. 

It is impossible that the public mind can advance in 
sound and self-consistent practical principles of action in 



CHAP. I.] 



AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT, 



15 



this world's affairs while conflicting views of science, 
religion, and the course of God's providence are poured 
forth from the pulpit and the press ; and it is equally 
impossible that the youthful mind can he trained to study, 
reverence, and conform to the course of God's providence, 
while that providence is treated with so little consideration 
by those who assume the character of accredited expositors 
of the Divine will. 

The questions, then, whether there be an intelligible 
course of Nature revealed to the human understanding, 
whether it should be taught to the young, and whether the 
religious sentiments should be trained to venerate and con- 
form to it as of Divine institution, are not barren specula- 
tions respecting dogmas and doctrines. They touch a 
highly momentous practical principle. While an impassable 
gulf stands between the views of God's providence on 
which society in its daily business acts, and the religious 
faith which it professes to hold, the influence of the latter 
on social conduct must necessarily be feeble and limited. 
It is a matter of great importance to have the principles of 
action and of belief brought into harmony. Nothing can 
retard the moral and intellectual advancement of the people 
more thoroughly than having a theology for Churches and 
Sundays, and a widely different code of principles for every- 
day conduct ; and yet this is, and must continue to be, the 
case with all the Christian nations while they fail to 
recognise and to study the order of Nature as a Divinely 
appointed guide to human action. 

A second Reformation in religion is imperatively called 
for, and is preparing. The devout teacher will recognise 
man and the natural world as constituted by Divine benevo- 
lence and wisdom, and as adapted to each other for man's 
instruction and benefit. He will communicate to the young 
a knowledge of that constitution and its adaptations as the 
Tbasis of their religious faith and practice in reference to 



16 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. I. 



this world. Until this change shall have been accom- 
plished, religion will never exert its due influence over 
human affairs. 

Thomas Carlyle, in treating of the theological opinions 
of the seventeenth century, observes that " the Christian 
doctrines which then dwelt alive in every heart have now 
in a manner died out of all hearts — very mournful to be- 
hold ; and are not the guidance of this world any more" 
Dr. Chalmers also says : " As things stand at present, our 
creeds and confessions have become effete, and the Bible a 
dead letter ; and that orthodoxy which was at one time 
the glory, by withering into the inert and lifeless, is now 
the shame and reproach of all our Churches." Again : 
" There must be a most deplorable want amongst us of 
'the light shining before men ' when, instead of glorifying 
our cause, they (men like Thomas Carlyle) can speak, and 
with a truth the most humiliating, of our inert and unpro- 
ductive orthodoxy."* 

Though in some respects erroneous, this representation 
is literally true in the sense in which I have explained 
the fact. It is chiefly in regard to the continuation of the 
special supernatural agency of God in this world that the 
belief of the seventeenth century has practically gone out. 
It has not been abandoned in direct terms ; on the con- 
trary, it is retained in the standards and instructions of the 
Churches, and is embraced, or attempted to be embraced, 
by many individuals ; but in point of fact it is no longer 
felt to be a reality by modern enlightened Christians. 

" Nay, worse still," continues Mr. Carlyle, " the cant of 
them does yet chvell alive with us ; little doubting that it is 
cant." With the ignorant it is not cant, but a sincere, 
although a sadly confused, belief. The strong-minded and 
well-informed men who have abandoned the ancient faith 



* North British Review, Vol. VI., p. 326, 



chap. I.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



17 



are wrong in supposing that it is cant in their weaker 
brethren. They are themselves to blame for not honestly 
disabusing them, and informing them that the belief of the 
seventeenth century was, in this particular, a mistake, and 
that it no longer constitutes a practical rule of action. 

Mr. Carlyle proceeds: "In which fatal intermediate 
state, the eternal sacreclness of this universe itself, of this 
human life itself, has fallen dark to the most of in:' This 
is lamentably true. The religious sentiments are not per- 
mitted practically to recognise the mode of God's adminis- 
tration in the ordinary course of Nature, as revealing His 
laws for the guidance of human conduct. We really 
are in the intermediate state here described. The old 
belief has partially died away : and our Churches scowl 
upon the new belief, which perhaps may help to remove 
the darkness which veils ''the eternal sacredness of this 
universe itself, and of this human life itself.'*' 

In Germany, which led the way in the first Reformation, 
the same truth has forced itself on the attention of religions 
men. Dr. Tholuck, Professor of Theology in the University 
of Halle, who is well known in this country as a distin- 
guished evangelical Protestant divine, remarks :— 

" We live in an age when mankind is particularly rich in 
means to render the elements and Nature subservient to their will. 
We live in a time vrhen the individual becomes every day more 
independent of restraining power : and if in the same measure in 
which this might, and dominion, and richness in means incr 
the fear of God and the consciousness of dependence on Him 
decreases more and more ; when all these gifts and all these 
means, instead of being used in the service of God and of His 
kingdom, are used in the service of selfishness and our own enjoy- 
ment : when man, through this dominion, becomes day after day 
more free from earthly restraints, hut each day more and more a 
slave to his earthly passions : when blinded man builds altars, and 
sings praises to his own skill and wit, instead of to his Heavenly 
Father, from whom cometh every good and perfect gift — oh ! have 
C 



18 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[chap. i. 



not even the ancients foretold what must become of such a gene- 
ration in that wonderful fable of the daring of Prometheus, who 
with violent hands stole from heaven its vivifying fire ? What 
we here speak of is no anxious dream, no unreal imagination ; no ! 

undeniable is the existing tendency in this generation to consecrate the 
temple which our pious forefathers reared to their Father in heaven to 
man, the fleeting son of an hour,' 1 * 

Who is to blame for this forgetf illness of God by the 
cultivators of science but the Churches that have omitted 
to teach the sacred character of Nature, and to acknowledge 
her instruction as Divine ? 

To those whose understandings have embraced the views 
which I am now advocating, and whose religious sentiments 
have been interwoven with them, " this eternal sacredness " 
stands forth in all the beauty, brightness, and intensity 
which it ever possessed in the minds of the men of the 
seventeenth century. Mr. Carlyle adds : " We think that 
too " (the " sacredness of the universe 5> ) " cant and a creed." 
Yes — men of science whose religious sentiments have never 
been led to recognise the Divine adaptations in Nature as 
proclamations of the Divine will and attributes, but who 
have pursued their investigations from intellectual or inter- 
ested motives alone, do regard the views which I am now 
advocating as " cant and a creed." To such persons I can 
only say that the religious sentiments exist in man : that 
the experience of all ages shows that in youth they may be 
directed to almost any object, and will ever afterwards 
cling to it as sacred ; and the question is — Whether their 
legitimate direction is exclusively to dogmas and formulas 
of belief in reference mainly to another world, framed 
by fallible men in the dark ages as true interpretations 
of Scripture ; or also towards that revelation which is 

* " A Selection from the University Sermons of Augustus Tholuck, 
D.D./'p. 181; London, Seeley, 1844. 



chap. I.] AN HISTORICAL RETROSPECT. 



10 



addressed by the great Pailer of the universe to man in 
Nature, and adapted to promote his improvement and 
enjoyment 1 

If we can persuade the people that the course of Nature, 
which determines their condition at every moment of their 
lives, "is the design — law — command — instruction (any 
word will do) of an all-powerful though unseen Ruler, it 
will become a religion with them ; obedience will be felt as 
a wish and a duty, an interest and a necessity." The friend 
from whose letter I quote these words adds : " But can you 
persuade mankind thus 1 I mean, can you give them a 
practical conviction?" I answer : In the present unsatis- 
factory condition of things, the experiment is at least worth 
trying. Whatever objections may exist to this proposal, 
something is needed to reconcile religion and science ; for, 
as Mr. Carlyle remarks, " the old names suggest new things 
to us — not august and Divine, but hypocritical, pitiable, 
and detestable. The old names and similitudes of belief 
still circulate from tongue to tongue, though now in such a 
ghastly condition : not as commandments of the living God, 
which we must do or perish eternally ; alas ! no, as something 
very different from that." 



20 



CHAPTER II. 

The Complex Chaeactee of Religion. 

In an inquiry into the relation between science and re- 
ligion, it is necessary to define what is meant by these terms. 
By science, then, I understand a systematic exposition 
of correctly observed facts concerning the constitution, 
qualities, modes of action, and relations of the objects of 
Nature. 

It is unnecessary to enlarge on the definition of science ; 
but, as much obscurity exists with respect to the nature 
and objects of religion, it may be useful to enter more fully 
into an elucidation of this subject. 

By general acknowledgment there is a distinction 
between the emotional and the intellectual faculties of men ; 
but the mind being considered by many as a single power, 
the distinction is, in their view, one of nomenclature 
merely. A little reflection will lead to a different belief. 

Religion is not a product of intellect alone. No kind, 
quantity, or quality, of intellectual conceptions will gen- 
erate religious emotions. On the other hand, the religious 
emotions which prompt us to reverence and adore cannot 
reach definite objects without the aid of the intellectual 
powers. These objects may be physical or they may be 
mental. Entwine the reverential emotions from infancy 
with the statue of Jupiter, and it will become a religious 
object ; connect them with dogmas and articles of faith, 
and these will be reverenced as religious truths. 

The kind of intellectual conceptions with which the 
religious emotions may be associated will depend upon the 



CHAP.it.] COMPLEX CHARACTER OF RELIGION. 21 



strength and cultivation of both of these orders of faculties. 
When the intellectual faculties are weak, the emotions may 
be trained to invest almost anything with the attribute of 
holiness, and to regard it with reverence. In ancient 
Egypt, reptiles and birds were objects of religious venera- 
tion. In Hindustan, Juggernaut is worshipped ; in Greece 
and Rome, Jupiter and Apollo, Juno, Venus, and Diana, 
and many other imaginary beings, were adored as deities. 
In those countries the religious emotions were trained from 
infancy to reverence the statues of these imaginary per- 
sonages as worthy of religious homage. 

The intellectual faculties not only perceive the external 
objects represented as sacred, but receive the instruction 
concerning their qualities which the religious teachers of 
the people choose to communicate ; and the combination of 
the religious emotions with these ideas constitutes the 
religion of the various worshippers. 

When, on the other hand, the intellectual faculties are 
powerful, and those of the religious emotions are feeble, the 
individual will with great difficulty attain a strong living 
religious character. He may try to believe dogmas, to 
perform ceremonies, and to conform to observances ; but he 
will feel, and penetrating observers will discover, that the 
unction of piety is not a powerful element in his mental 
constitution. 

Religion, in the common acceptation of the term, means 
a system of Divine faith and worship, and thus used, it 
expresses only external objects. In the present treatise 
I consider it as a mental state, made up of certain emotions 
and intellectual conceptions. In this subjective sense, the 
two are necessary to constitute religion. 

As this proposition is a fundamental one in the dis- 
cussions on which we are about to enter, and as it will 
probably be new to some readers, a few illustrations of it 
may be useful, In the following instances, objects possessing 



22 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. II. 



in themselves no sacred qualities are invested with such 
a character by becoming associated with the religious 
emotions. 

In England, for example, graveyards and churches are 
consecrated, and in Scotland they usually are not. What 
constitutes consecration? A bishop performs certain cere- 
monies, reads certain prayers, and declares the ground holy 
and set apart to receive the bodies of believers, there to 
rest till the resurrection. In like manner he declares the 
Church to be sacred, and dedicates it to the worship of God. 
In England, the religious emotions are, from infancy, 
entwined with these ceremonies and objects ; and in the 
mind of the thoroughbred Church of England Christian, 
in whom the religious sentiment is active, these places 
actually become sacred. He shudders at the idea of being 
buried in unconsecrated ground, and is shocked at the pro- 
posal to transact secular business in a church. If there 
were a naturally sacred character in the burial-ground and 
church, consecration would be unnecessary ; and as it is 
incredible that the ceremonies change their nature, the 
change can occur only in the minds of the people. 

How are these acts viewed by the staunch Scottish Pres- 
byterian — one trained from infancy to venerate Calvin and 
John Knox, the Shorter Catechism, the Westminster Con- 
fession of Faith, and his own Church ceremonies — and 
taught, moreover, that Episcopalians persecuted his ances- 
tors to death, and still profess a religion closely allied to 
Eomanism ? To such a person the ceremonies of consecra- 
tion appear as unmeaning and unreal as the incantations of 
the witches in Macbeth ; the graveyard appears to him 
merely a piece of ground, and the church four walls and 
a roof ; and he regards as a superstitious fancy the holy 
character in which these appear to the Englishman. And 
why does he do so ? Because he views them through his 
intellect alone, which experiences no emotions ; while, from 



chap.il] COMPLEX CHARACTER OF RELIGION. 23 



infancy, feelings of hatred have been associated in his mind 
with the Episcopalian doctrines and ritual. 

With the sound Scottish Presbyterian no edifice is sacred. 
In Edinburgh, a theatre was long used on week-days for 
the drama, and on Sundays as a church. The English 
Churchman would have revolted at this practice. A con- 
gregation of the Free Church of Scotland worshipped in 
a music-hall ; and in the new cemeteries, a portion of 
the ground is consecrated for the burial of Episcopalians, 
while the remainder is unconsecrated for Presbyterian use. 
A line on the ground-plan or a walk in the graveyard 
distinguishes the parts, but no demarcation indicative 
of difference of character is discernible. 

The name given to the intellectual ideas Avhich enter 
into the composition of religion is Theology. It means 
the notions which we form concerning the Being to whom, 
or the objects to which, our reverential and devotional 
emotions should be directed. 

" Lo the poor Indian ! whose untutored mind 
Sees God in clouds, or hears Him in the wind." 

This is the theology of the Indian. The Hindus and 
the Mahommedans have embodied their theology — in other 
words, their notions concerning the objects to be reverenced 
and worshipped— in books. The emotional faculties of the 
people being trained to reverence as Divine revelations 
the narratives and dogmas which these books contain, the 
compound becomes in their minds religion. Hence, a man 
may be highly religious, and know nothing of theology 
beyond the narratives and dogmas which have been en- 
twined with his religious emotions from his infancy ; while 
another may be a profound theologian, acquainted with the 
originallanguages of Scripture, skilled in all the controversies 
which have taken place concerning the authors by whom 



24 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. n. 



its different parts were written, the time and order of their 
appearance, their title to the attribute of inspiration, and 
the true meaning of their texts, and yet may not be re- 
ligious. In point of fact, experience shows that, in many 
instances, the more an individual knows of these subjects, the 
less religious, in the common acceptation of the word, he 
becomes ; that is to say, his reverence for the special 
dogmas and observances, which in his youth he was trained 
to regard with religious awe, diminishes. 

The primitive emotion, when energetic and excited, is so 
overpowering, that it carries the whole mind captive. When 
it acts blindly, it dethrones reason, stifles conscience, and 
enlists every passion to vindicate the honour and glory of 
the Being whom it has been trained to reverence. When 
the woof of error has been added in infancy, and the web 
of superstition has been formed, every thread — that is to 
say, every notion concerning God and His priests, and man's 
duty to both — becomes sacred in the eyes of the devotee, 
and stirs the emotion into a glow of rapture if gratified, 
and of pain, accompanied by indignation and fury, if 
offended. In this state of mind, barbarous nations plunder 
and slay in honour of and to the glory of their gods. 

In Christian nations, analogous phenomena appear. We 
all profess to draw our religion from the Bible ; but in Scot- 
land, one woof is woven into the warp, in England another, 
in Ireland a third, in Germany a fourth, in Russia a fifth, 
and so on. In Scotland, my own country, the woof consists 
of certain views of God, of human nature, and of man's 
state, duties, and destiny, embodied in the Shorter Cate- 
chism and the Westminster Confession of Faith. In our 
infancy these are woven by our parents and clergy into the 
very core of our religious emotion, and the resulting texture 
is our religion. The union is so intimate, and the web so 
firmly knit together, that most of us have no conception of 
anything being religion except this our own compound web 



chap, il] COMPLEX CHARACTER OF RELIGION. 25 



of devotion and intellectual doctrine. The doctrine is to 
us as sacred as the emotion, and he who controverts it is 
regarded as the enemy of our religion. 

In barbarous ages, Christian men, acting under this im- 
pression, burned those who controverted their interpreta- 
tions of Scripture ; and in our own day they calumniate them 
as infidels. Nevertheless, the doctrine which they thus 
regard as unquestionably Divine is a mere human woof, 
composed of inferences drawn from particular texts of 
Scripture by mortal men assembled at Westminster in the 
seventeenth century : men fallible like ourselves, and many 
of them more ignorant, though the intimate union of the 
doctrine with our devotional emotion is apt to incapacitate 
our mind from so regarding it. 

We obtain direct and irresistible proof that such is the 
fact by merely crossing the Border, or St. George's Channel. 
In England, the woof is composed of the Liturgy and the 
Episcopalian Catechism. The Englishman into whose de- 
votional emotion the doctrines of these books have been 
woven from infancy cannot conceive that anything but his 
own web of opinion is the true religion. Cross the Channel 
again, to Roman Catholic Ireland, and there you find that 
the Pope and Councils have fashioned other standards of 
faith, and that the priests have woven them into the warp 
of the Irish mind ; and this web constitutes its religion. 

The difference between Religion and Theology, which 
I have here endeavoured to indicate, may also be illus- 
trated by comparing them to the warp and the woof of 
a web. In our present problem the native sentiment of 
reverence and devotion may be likened to the warp. It 
is the foundation, or first element, of the web. The theo- 
logical ideas may be considered as the cross thread, or woof. 
As the shuttle adds the woof to the warp to make the cloth, 
so the intellect adds theology, or particular notions about 
God, to the emotion, and the two combined constitute what 



2*3 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. II. 



we commonly call religion. The Hindu religion is the 
primitive pure emotion, plus such intellectual ideas as the 
priests of the country have been able to weave into it. 
The Mahommedan and Christian religions may be described 
in similar terms ; and thus it is that the composite web 
of reverential emotion and intellectual ideas formed by each 
nation for itself is called its religion. 

Nay, the clergy of different sects have woven notions 
about Church government and ceremonies into the warp, 
and have made these also appear portions of religion ; and 
men fight for and defend them with as much zeal as if they 
were attributes of God. 

We may now understand why it is that we are afflicted 
with such deadly strifes and hatred in the name of religion. 
" The clouds that intercept the heavens from us come not 
from the heavens, but from the earth."' The thing we call 
religion is a compound web. and when our neighbour shows 
us his threads of religious opinion and calls them Divine, 
we. into whose minds they have not been woven, survey 
his fabric with the eye of reason, and pronounce it to 
be partly pure and partly spurious. Our neighbours de- 
votional feeling receives a rude shock ; he becomes angry, 
and attacks our web of religion in his turn, and treats it 
in a similar way. Neither of us, probably, is capable of 
examining closely and calmly the threads that constitute 
the woof of his own web, and hence discord between 
religious parties is interminable. 

In the prevalent creeds, Nature is not recognised as 
sacred ; no dogmas are founded on scientific truth and 
systematically combined with the religious emotions, so as 
to invest them with a religious character. This appears 
to be the true cause why no practical natural religion 
exists, and why none can be formed until we venture on 
a new religious Reformation. It explains also why "the 
eternal sacredness of this universe itself, of this human life 



chap, il] COMPLEX CHARACTER OF RELIGION. 27 



itself, lias fallen dark to the most of us." Meanwhile, the 
union between the religious emotions and the prevalent 
dogmas, being cemented by no natural bond, is in constant 
danger of dislocation, either by forcible and confident 
appeals made by other pretending authorities to the reli- 
gious emotions themselves, as in the case of Mormonism, 
or by the teachings of science rendering it impossible for 
the intellect to recognise the truth of the established 
doctrines. 

The absence of a rational foundation for their faith has 
recently been shown by the prevalence, even among the 
educated classes, of belief in spirit-rapping and table- 
turning. Professing to believe in the sublime doctrines of 
heaven and hell, and some of them in that of purgatory, 
they have actually embraced the notion, and have earnestly 
acted on it. that the spirits of the dead can be evoked from 
those awful abodes, and induced to answer the most trum- 
pery questions by the invocation of practitioners who make 
gain of the popular credulity. 

Is the human mind to continue for ever to have its 
religion stamped upon it like a pattern on potter's clay, 
and to retain and act upon it through life, irrespective 
altogether of a foundation in Nature \ And can religions 
that repudiate, or at least neglect Nature, and rest chiefly 
on mediaeval interpretations of sacred books, be calculated 
to promote the civilisation of man amidst the blaze of light 
and reason which is every hour revealing the imperfection 
of the popular notions, and their conflict with the works 
and will of the Almighty ] Let us not shrink from answer- 
ing these questions, but let us boldly, yet humbly, inquire 
into the resources afforded by the present state of know- 
ledge for improving our religious systems. 

To attain this object, it appears necessary to inquire 
whether science affords a foundation for a natural theology 
and a natural religion. In order to answer this question 



2^ 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAP. II. 



we must consider, 1st, The natural evidence for the exist- 
ence of a Supreme Being ; 2ndly, Whether we can trace- 
Divine government in the phenomena of the physical and 
moral departments of the world ? 3rdly, If such government 
be discernible, by what means is it maintained and rendered 
efficient ? Athly, Whether specific duties are revealed and 
prescribed to man by this government, and what these are ? 
— the answers to these questions will constitute our natural 
theology ; and lastly , Whether, by entwining with the 
religious emotions the views of God, of His government, 
and of the duties which He prescribes, we shall be able 
to confer a religious character on these truths, and thus 
constitute a natural religion ? If we succeed in those 
objects, we shall render science sacred, invest the practical 
duties of life with a religious character, and produce a faith 
calculated to expand and purify itself by every advance in 
the discovery of truth, and to reinforce, by all the power 
and fervour of our highest emotions, the progress of 
mankind towards the utmost degree of improvement and 
happiness which human nature is fit to attain. 



29 



CHAPTER III. 

OF GOD. 

The highest object to which the religious emotions of any 
people are directed constitutes their God. Their notions 
concerning that object being associated with the religious 
emotions, the object becomes sacred, is hallowed, and 
adored ; and these opinions become the grand foundation 
of the rest of their faith. The natural and mental process 
by which ideas of God have been formed appears to be the 
following. The faculties * of Wonder and Veneration give 
us a tendency to believe in a supernatural cause of the 
remarkable phenomena of Nature which we see and feel, 
but cannot comprehend. The faculties of Individuality 
and Imitation prompt us to personify abstract ideas and 
active powers. 

The Greeks and the Romans, unable to account scien- 
tifically for the cause of the winds, imagined it to be a 
supernatural power, personified it, and called it iEolus, or 
the God of the Winds. Roused to admiration by the 
teeming fertility of the soil, and unable to comprehend its 
cause, they attributed it also to a supernatural power, and 
personified it ; and as, in the animal economy, the producer 
is feminine, they were led by analogy to regard it as of this 
sex ; hence arose the goddess Geres. These nations multi- 
plied deities to represent the causes of all the interesting 
and impressive phenomena of nature of which they could 
give no other account, including human passions, emotions, 

* Combe's Scheme of the Human Faculties may be found in his 
" Constitution of Man," Chapter II. 



30 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. m. 



and intellectual powers. Mars was the god of war, the 
personification of Combativeness and Destructiveness ; 
Minerva the goddess of wisdom, the personification of 
the moral sentiments and the intellect ; and so forth. 

These notions, being entwined in youth with the reli- 
gious emotions of the people, became religious truths, and 
led to important results. First — They diverted the national 
mind from inquiring into the natural causes of the pheno- 
mena, which they ascribed to the agency of these super- 
natural powers ; and hence, when evil overtook them, such 
as famine, or shipwreck, or pestilence, they attributed it to 
the displeasure of Ceres, or of iEolus, or of Jupiter. Instead 
of endeavouring to remove its natural causes, or to protect 
themselves by natural means against their influence, the 
Greeks sought to discover w T hy the supernatural Power 
was offended, and how it might be appeased and its favour 
secured: and ascribing to it passions and emotions like 
their own, they sacrificed animals, and occasionally men, to 
assuage its anger, and offered ' incense, sang praises, and 
presented gifts to gratify its senses and its love of glory. 

Secondly — These errors, having become sacred, prompted 
the people to regard everyone who tried to deliver them 
from their superstitions as a blasphemer and contemner of 
the gods, and to punish him severely. 

The Jews were taught higher conceptions of the great 
supernatural Power named God. Their earlier Scriptures 
represent Him as existing in the form of a man ; for we 
are told that God made man after His own image, which 
implies that God had a form like the human ; and it is 
narrated that, on one occasion, Moses saw the hinder parts 
of God's person. Moreover, the Jewish Scriptures ascribe 
to God human passions : they represent Him as angry, 
jealous, revengeful, capable of being moved from His 
object by entreaty, and pleased with praise, sacrifices, and 
incense. Elsewhere, however, they ascribe to Him the^ 



CHAP. III. J 



OF GOD. 



31 



sublimest attributes which the human faculties can con- 
ceive : unity, eternal existence, ubiquity, omniscience, omni- 
potence, and all the human virtues. 

These ideas of Gocl were w r oven into the religious 
emotions of the Jewish people, and became the foundation 
of their religion. They were greatly superior to the ideas 
of the Greeks and Romans, and of other contemporaneous 
nations ; and this superiority has been one natural cause 
why the Jews maintained themselves as a distinct 
people after their expulsion from Judea, and when living 
in society with the professors of all the other creeds of the 
world. 

Mahommedan writers recognise, to some extent, the dis- 
tinction between theology and religion, and name the first 
Imdn, and the second Bin. Mahomet, the founder of this 
faith, appears to have borrowed his ideas of God from the 
Jews. He " emphatically proclaims that there is but one 
God, the Creator and Governor of the universe — omni- 
present, eternal, omniscient, omnipotent — most holy, w T ise, 
good, and merciful." In the Koran we find these words : — 
" God ! there is no God but He, the living, the self- 
subsisting ; . . • He knoweth that which is past, and 
that which is to come ; . . . His throne is extended over 
heaven and earth, and the preservation of both is no 
burden to Him. He is the high and mighty." (Ch. vi.) 
And again : " He hath spread the earth as a bed for you 
and the heaven as a covering, and hath caused water to 
descend from heaven, and thereby produced fruits for 
your sustenance. . . . He directeth whom He pleaseth 
into the right way. Gocl knoweth that which ye do ; . . . 
and whether ye manifest that which is in your minds, or 
conceal it, God will call you to account for it, and will 
forgive whom He pleaseth, and will punish whom He 
pleaseth ; for God is almighty. Your God is one God ; 
there is no God but He— the most merciful." (Ch. ii.) 



32 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAP. Ill, 



"In the creed of Islam, the Christian doctrine of the 
Trinity is distinctly repudiated. In the Mahommedan Con- 
fession of Faith it is declared, 'As He never begot any 
person whatsoever, so He Himself was begotten by none : 
as He never was a son, so He never hath been a father.' 

" In their search after the true ideal of the Divine 
nature, the faithful are directed to the works of creation 
and the benign agencies of Providence— to the sun and 
stars, to the clouds, to the rain and winds, and to their 
vivifying influences on the animal and vegetable world — as 
' signs to people of understanding.' (Koran, ch. ii.) But, 
looking to the mutability and the limited existence and 
duration of all mere earthly and sensible objects, idolatry 
and creature-worship are denounced, as suggesting low and 
unworthy ideas of the Divine nature and character. 'What- 
ever rises,' says the Koran, ' must set ; whatever is born 
must die ; and whatever is corruptible must decay and 
perish.' (Ch. vi.) On such grounds, the worship of saints 
and images, and the use of pictorial or other representations 
of living things, were strictly forbidden. 

" The belief in angels, which from time immemorial had 
been universal throughout the East, was adopted into the 
creed of Islam. 

" As to the Koran, Mahommedans were required to believe 
that it was not the work of the Prophet himself, but that it 
was an emanation from ' the very essence of God ; that it 
was preserved from all eternity, near the throne of God, on 
a vast table, called 'The preserved Table,' on which were 
also inscribed the Divine decrees, relating to all events, 
both past and future ; and that the angel Gabriel was 
sent down with a transcript from it to the lowest heaven, 
whence he revealed it to Mahomet, from time to time, in 
successive portions, as circumstances required. A view, 
however, of the entire volume of Scripture, bound in silk 
and adorned with precious stones, was vouchsafed to the 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



33 



Prophet once a year ; and during the last year of his life he 
was twice indulged with that privilege." * 

The notions of God before quoted form the great 
foundation of the Mahommedan religion. The doctrines and 
practices of the Koran derive their sanctity from being 
believed to be revelations of His will. Some of these 
doctrines harmonise with the order of God's natural pro- 
vidence, but many of them are at variance. with it ; and the 
whole being entwined w T ith the religious emotions in the 
minds of the people, the two form together their religion. 

Like the religions of Greece and Rome, Mahommedan- 
ism averts the minds of its votaries from inquiring into the 
course of God's natural providence, paralyses the intellect 
by limiting the scope of its pursuits, diverts the moral and 
religious emotions from their highest objects, and renders 
sacred every error which the Koran contains. It thus con- 
stitutes a huge barrier to progressive civilisation. 

Mahommedans propagate their religion by the sword, 
and succeed. They force parents in the conquered nations 
to allow their children to be taught religion by the Mahom- 
medan priests. These find little difficulty in entwining the 
Koran with the religious emotions of the young, and in one 
generation produce many sincere believers in the imposed 
faith. These are constantly augmenting, until the whole 
people become Mahommedans. 

The Christian religion overthrew the religion of Greece 
and Koine, and took its place. In the age when this 
happened, little natural science existed ; printing had not 
been invented, books were scarce and dear, and the mass of 
the people could neither read nor write. In Italy, the 
clergy introduced into Christian worship the use of pictures, 
in which were represented God the Father, under the form 

* " Cyclopaedia of Religious Denominations; " London, Griffin & 
Co.; article " Mahommedanism," by John Bell, A.M., formerly 
Professor in the Elphinston College, Bombay. 
D 



34 



SCIEXCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAP. III. 



of an old man ; Jesus Christ, the Son, as a young man : and 
the Holy Spirit as a dove ; and they trained the people to 
regard these three as one, the only true God. They 
ascribed attributes and offices to each of these persons, 
founded on interpretations of Scripture ; and their notions 
constitute the general Christian idea of God. They en- 
twined these with the religious emotions, and thus formed 
them into important elements of the Christian faith. 

They also led the emotions to reverence the Scriptures 
as a revelation of the Divine will ; but they did not trust 
the people with the sacred books themselves. They formed 
dogmas out of them, and trained the people to reverence 
these as an epitome, and as correct interpretations, of the 
sacred volume. Moreover, the Koruan Catholic clergy told 
the people that the true meaning of Scripture was, in some 
instances, obscure • that, in their state of unavoidable 
ignorance, they might err in their interpretations of it and 
imperil their souls, and that the Pope and assembled clergy 
were far better judges of its import ; and thus they per- 
suaded the laity to dispense with the exercise of their own 
judgment, and to accept, reverence, and believe whatever 
the clergy represented to them to be Divine truth. 

Great knowledge of human nature was displayed in this 
proceeding. In a barbarous age, the emotions were neces- 
sarily much more powerful than the intellect, and by 
authoritatively presenting to them images and dogmas, 
and rendering these sacred by entwining them with the 
emotions, the clergy constituted this compound their re- 
ligion. By excluding the privilege of private judgment, 
they aimed at securing perfect unity of faith and doctrine 
in the Church, and conferring repose of mind on the 
individual believer. 

Had it been possible to maintain the intellect of the 
laity permanently in the condition in which it was when 
this system of religion was founded, and had the clergy 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



35 



abstained from violating their own precepts in their 
practical conduct, the Roman Catholic faith might have had 
an indefinite existence over Europe. But the invention of 
printing conferred on the people the power of reading, and 
this roused their intellectual faculties and prompted them 
to inquire into the accordance of their religion with 
Scripture ; while the dissolute character of the clergy at 
the time shocked their moral faculties, and a reformation of 
religious doctrine and observances ensued. 

The Reformers continued to preserve unbroken the 
association between the Scriptures and the religious emo- 
tions of the people, and recognised these writings as Divine 
revelation ; but they asserted the right of the laity to read 
and interpret the Bible for themselves. By abolishing the 
use of images and pictures, they dissolved the connection 
between these and the religious emotions. The only intel- 
lectual object which the leaders of the Reformation at first 
presented to the laity, as a substratum for their religious 
emotions, was the Scriptures. If the right of private judg- 
ment had been intended to be a reality, they should have 
left every Christian to extract the true meaning of the 
sacred volume for himself, and to combine it w T ith his own 
religious emotions, and thus to constitute an individual 
religion. This would have been the infallible result of 
consistent action on their own principles ; because, as no 
two individuals possess the intellectual and the emotional 
faculties developed in precisely the same degree, men's 
natural powers of interpreting Scripture differ, and differ- 
ences in cultivation and literary and historical acquirements 
also lead to variety of interpretations. 

This result is the more inevitable because the Bible 
contains no system of theology, but is composed chiefly of 
narratives, descriptions, sublime effusions of devotion, and 
much sound morality, bound together by no obvious logical 
connection. 
D 2 



33 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. m. 



The leaders of the Reformation were net slow to perceive 
the consequences of this state of things. To found a sect, 
a series of dogmas must be extracted from the Bible, and 
the religious emotions must be trained to accept and 
reverence them as religious truths. The Reformers carried 
this principle into practice, framed epitomes of Scriptural 
doctrine, and taught the laity to believe in them as sound 
expositions of Divine revelation. 

The present religions of Europe consist of dogmas com- 
piled or deduced, in distant ages, from the Bible, by men 
ignorant of natural science and of the real order of the 
Divine government on earth. These have been intertwined, 
from generation to generation, with the religious emotions, 
and are all sacred in the eyes of believers. So completely 
is this the case, that when a clergyman is accused of preach- 
ing heresy, he is not allowed to appeal to the Scriptures to 
prove the soundness of his views ; but his doctrine is tried 
by the standards of his Church, and he is condemned if he 
has deviated from them, whatever the Scriptures may prove 
to the contrary. 

We read the Koran with our intellect alone ; and in 
consequence of our religious emotions never having been 
intertwined with its text, it bears no aspect of sacredness to 
us. On the other hand, we find great difficulty in reading 
the Bible and our religious formulas with our intellect 
alone ; because our religious emotions have been trained 
from our infancy to venerate the former as Divine revela- 
tion, and the latter as true interpretations of it. When the 
Mahommedan reads the Bible, he judges of it by his intellect, 
or tries it by the Koran ; and finding in it some parts like 
his own sacred standard, he approves of these, but finding 
other portions in discord with it, these he condemns. The 
Mahommedan will never judge soundly of the Koran till lie 
becomes capable of trying it by his intellect alone, and com- 
paring it with the laws of God inscribed in the Book of 



chap, in.] 



OF GOD. 



37 



Nature. When lie shall become capable of this comparison, 
he will accept as Divine only such of its doctrines as 
harmonise with natural truth. 

In a future chapter I shall inquire to what extent our 
Christian formulas are aiding or impeding our civilisation ; 
meantime, I desire it to be understood that I cast no im- 
putation on their compilers. These theologians are not 
chargeable with disrespect to God in omitting to direct the 
religious emotions to His works and agency in Nature ; 
because at the time when they wrote, there were few ex- 
positions of these deserving the name of science, or worthy 
of being combined with the religious emotions, and rendered 
sacred. And even now I have no charge to prefer against 
the clergy who still fail to teach the sacred character of 
Nature, and who conscientiously substitute these dogmas 
in its place, although in many respects at variance with 
what appears to me to be the order of God's moral govern- 
ment of the world 

We have hitherto considered the Greek and Eoman 
notions of God derived from the simple suggestions of the 
human faculties acting in the absence of scientific knowledge 
of Nature ; and also those derived by other nations from 
books believed by them to be Divine. We may now briefly 
inquire into the ideas concerning God which may be 
legitimately drawn from Nature in the present state of 
our knowledge. 

The first difficulty that meets us in this inquiry arises 
from the depth to which, during our whole lives, our 
religious emotions have been imbued with dogmatic ideas 
on the subject. Notions concerning the existence and 
attributes of God were impressed upon us by our mothers 
and nurses at the first dawn of our intelligence ; were mul- 
tiplied and ingrained in us in our youth by perusal of the 
Scriptures, and by instruction in catechisms and articles of 



38 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[chap. m. 



faith : and were enforced in adult life by the pulpit, the 
press, and the general voice of society. To unravel the 
threads of this religious web. and to discover how many of 
them we owe to God's revelations of Himself in His works, 
and how many to human instruction — and. moreover, to dis- 
criminate the real title of the threads of human construction 
to form parts of the web of belief at all— may baffle the 
acutest understanding. Nevertheless, if we direct our 
attention to the Hindu, the Mahommedan, or any other false 
religion, we shall have little difficulty in perceiving how 
important it would be to succeed in such an analysis of the 
notions concerning God entertained by its adherents, with 
a view to redeeming them from the practical consequences 
of their erroneous opinions as to His nature and His 
will. 

There is reason to believe that a similar process of 
analysis of the threads of their faith might benefit the 
European nations also ; because nothing is more certain 
than that, although all profess to derive their views of God 
and of His will from Scripture, not only nations and sects, 
but also individuals of the same sect, differ widely from 
one another in their opinions regarding these momentous 
subjects. Every one, therefore, cannot be holding the 
truth ; and error reduced to practice must lead to disaster 
in Europe, as certainly as in Turkey or in Hindustan. Let 
us, therefore, at least attempt to discover what lessons 
unaided Nature teaches us in regard to God and His will. 

There are two opinions regarding the natural sources of 
our belief in the existence of God — one that it is intuitive ; 
and the other that it is a deduction of reason. Eeason may 
assist us in examining and analysing the circumstances in 
which our intuitive convictions arise, but it cannot account 
for them. In the science of Optics, for example, we find 
expositions of the compound nature of light, and of the 
kinds of surfaces which reflect the green rays, and cause 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



39 



these objects to appear to us green ; of others that reflect 
the red rays, and are seen by us as red : and so forth : but 
we see no necessary connection between the appearances of 
these surfaces and their power to reflect different rays, or 
between these rays and our own mental perceptions of 
colour. Our perceptions, and the convictions which attend 
them, are pure intuitions — the results simply of the con- 
stitution of our faculties and their adaptations to external 
Nature. 

Xow, it appears to me that by the constitution of the 
mental faculties, particularly those of Wonder, Veneration, 
and Ideality, and their relations to external objects, belief 
in a supernatural Power arises intuitively in the minds of 
persons with a well-constituted brain, from the perception 
and comprehension of the qualities, phenomena, and rela- 
tions of the outward world. Here also reason may in- 
vestigate the circumstances under which this intuitive 
belief arises, and extend and deepen it ; but it is not its 
source. This view is fortified by the fact that we find the 
existence of a supernatural Power recognised by all the 
races of men in whom the faculties named above are even 
moderately developed, however ignorant of science they 
may be. 

But the qualities or attributes of this Power are de- 
ductions of reason, and nations and individuals view these 
differently, according to the differences that exist in the 
development of their brains or in their intellectual culti- 
vation. From the same cause they interpret differently the 
statements of Scripture on those subjects. The nature of 
God (Unity or Trinity), and His attributes, are apprehended 
differently by different minds, all drawing their conclusions 
from the Bible. Some believe that the First Person of the 
Trinity possesses qualities that rendered it indispensable for 
Him to demand the sacrifice of the Second Person as the 
sole condition on which He could forgive the sins of mankind ; 



40 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. [chap. m. 



whik others consider this to be an erroneous interpretation 
of Scripture concerning the character of God. Many other 
discordant views of the Divine Nature and Attributes are 
known to prevail even among the sincerest Christians ; 
and these show that the Bible does not protect us from 
forming different opinions of its import when differences 
exist in the development of our brains and in our intel- 
lectual cultivation. 

The manner in which reason may throw light on the 
circumstances in which our intuitive belief in God arises 
may now be considered. 

If the definition of a cause given by Dr. Thomas Brown, 
namely, that ' ; priority in the sequence observed, and invari- 
ableness of antecedence in the past and future sequences 
supposed, are the elements, and the only elements, combined 
in the notion of a cause,'"' be correct, it appears to me to be 
impossible to elucidate or strengthen by reason our intuitive 
belief in the existence of a God. On that supposition, the 
whole external world will exhibit only a succession of 
phenomena. However regular the sequences may be, and 
for however long a period they may have been observed, 
nothing seems to be implied in mere sequence that indicates 
anything beyond the phenomena themselves, and the cir- 
cumstances in which they occur. 

When, however, the faculty of Causality is developed, 
the perception of antecedence and sequence in phenomena is 
accompanied by a belief, intuitive and irresistible, that in 
the antecedent there exists a quality of ]ioicer and efficiency 
to produce the sequent. The proper function of Causality, 
I take it, is to produce this belief, and it is only when the 
antecedent is thus viewed that it can properly be called a 
cause. There may be complex antecedents to one effect, but 
on analysing them we recognise those only as causes in 
which we discern active power. Everything else belongs to 
the category of circumstances. 



CHAr. III.] 



OF GOD. 



41 



Let any one, for example, observe the appearances of the 
clouds as they float along a summer sky, borne onward by a 
gentle, breeze, and let him note their forms, colours, and 
magnitude, and try to draw conclusions regarding the 
succession of forms or other attributes which will cha- 
racterise the clouds floating on a similar breeze to-morrow. 
Here are antecedents and subsequents in abundance, but we 
soon discover that the clouds exhibiting these phenomena 
do not enable us to draw conclusions in regard to the suc- 
cession of future clouds. 

The reason of our hesitation is, that we have no belief oi 
the antecedent cloud being the cause of the characteristics 
of the one that succeeds it. There is the absence of that 
regularity in the sequence which indicates the relation of 
cause and effect ; but it is not the mere absence of this 
order which we recognise — its absence suggests the thought 
that the antecedent cloud is not the cause of the appear- 
ances of the subsequent one, and we are prompted to search 
deeper, in order to discover what the cause is. We may 
discover substances, agents, or forces, such as are treated of 
in the science of Meteorology, more adequate to produce the 
effects. As formerly observed, however, Causality appears 
to produce only a belief in efficiency, without giving us a 
notion of the nature of the efficient cause. 

The mental process by which conviction of intelligence 
in a cause is attained may be illustrated by referring to the 
sun and the eye as an example. These objects exist, and the 
one is obviously adapted to the other : the sun to give light, 
and the eye to receive it, to modify it, and thus to enable us 
to see. The eye and the sun did not arrange this relation- 
ship themselves. If these are contemplated, no necessary 
connection can be perceived between the two. There is no- 
thing in the sun that necessarily implies the existence of eyes ; 
and nothing in the eye that necessarily implies the existence 
of the sun. Nevertheless, the relationship of adaptation exists 



42 



SCIENCE AttD RELIGION. 



[chap. III. 



between them. Comparison and Causality, if adequately 
developed, cannot ascribe adaptation to either of the two 
structures, because both are required to render it possible. 
The adaptation, therefore, not being an attribute of either, 
and yet the perception of it being produced in the mind by 
the contemplation of the objects, the hypothesis of the exist- 
ence of an intelligence external to both the eyes and the sun, 
which instituted it, seems alone capable of accounting for it. 

All Nature is full of adaptations. The structure of the 
lungs is adapted to the air, and that of the muscles to the 
force of gravitation ; the structure of plants is adapted at 
once to the sun, the air, and the soil ; and so forth. 
Causality and Comparison, therefore, are furnished with 
such innumerable examples of what appear to them to be 
designed adaptations, that they cannot rest in the assump- 
tion that these are merely accidental or inherent qualities 
of matter. 

It has been said, that as science advances the Deity 
recedes. If by this is meant that the hypothesis of God's 
irregular action becomes more and more untenable, the 
statement is correct ; but in the sense that the evidence of 
His existence, power, and wisdom becomes feebler, it is a 
mistake. The most stupendous idea of the universe that 
has yet been formed is that which supposes every fixed star 
to be a sun like our own, with planets circling round it, and 
the whole to be revolving round a more gigantic and hitherto 
undiscovered central orb. But this hypothesis assumes that 
the stars move round the central sun in virtue of forces of 
the same nature and obeying the same laws as those which 
prevail in the earth ; so that, even according to this view, 
the Deity is as directly influencing our planet as the 
heavenly host. The faculties of Causality and Comparison, 
judging from these data, support our intuitive belief that an 
extramundane Power and Intelligence exists, and that it 
instituted those adaptations. 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



43 



It is objected that reason does not warrant our belief in 
the self-existence of God ; and some affirm that, for anything 
we know to the contrary, the Ruler of the world may Him- 
self own a superior, and have been created. Their argument 
is stated in this form : " You who believe in God from 
intuition must submit your belief to the scrutiny of reason. 
If you admit that every Being must have a cause, then this 
Being Himself is an effect You have no warrant in your 
intuitions, and there is no evidence from reason, for TLis self- 
existence or self creation ; and, as He does exist, you must 
assign a cause of Him, on the same principle that you regard 
Him as the cause of the material creation." The atheists 
carry this argument the length of an absolute denial of God, 
in respect that it is only the first cause that, according to 
them, can legitimately be regarded as Deity ; and the first 
cause, say they, is to us unknown. 

The following answer to this objection may be considered. 
The knowing faculties perceive objects directly, and Causality 
infers qualities from manifestations. To be able to judge 
thoroughly of any object, the whole of these faculties must 
be employed on it. When a watch, for example, is presented 
to us, the knowing faculties perceive its springs, lever, and 
wheels, and Causality discerns the object or design. If the 
question is put, Whence did the watch proceed ?— then, 
from the nature of its materials as perceived by the knowing 
faculties, Causality infers that it could not make itself ; and 
from discovering intelligence and design in the adaptation 
of its parts, this faculty concludes that its cause must 
have possessed these qualities, and therefore assigns its 
production to an intelligent artificer. 

Suppose the statement to be next made—-" This artificer 
himself is an existence, and every existence must have a 
cause ; who, then, made the watchmaker 1 ; ' In this case, if 
no farther information were presented to Causality than 
what it could obtain by contemplating the structure of the 



44 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. hi. 



watch, the answer would necessarily be, that it could not 
tell. But let the artificer, or man, be submitted to the joint 
observation of the knowing faculties and Causality, and let 
the question be put, AVho made him ? — the knowing powers, 
by examining the structure of his body, would present 
Causality with data from which it could unerringly infer 
that, although it perceived in him intelligence and power 
sufficient to make the watch, yet, from the nature of his 
constitution, he could not have made himself. Proceeding 
in the investigation, Causality, still aided by the knowing 
faculties, would perceive the most striking indications of 
power, benevolence, and design in the human frame ; and 
from contemplating these, it would arrive at a conviction 
that the watchmaker is the work of a great, powerful, and 
intelligent Being. 

If, however, the question were now put, Whence did this 
Being proceed? Causality could not answer, any more than 
it could tell, from seeing the watch alone, who made the 
watchmaker. The perceptive faculties cannot observe the 
substance of the Maker of the human body ; His existence 
is suggested by Comparison and Causality ; and all that 
they can accomplish is to infer His existence and His 
qualities or attributes from perceiving their manifestation. 
They have no data for inferring that He had an ante- 
cedent. 

The argument now stated is objected to in a letter 
written to me by a deceased friend of great talents and 
attainments on the following grounds : — "The argument of 
Design/' it is said, "is d posteriori. It is an argument of 
analogy. It ascends from the known to the unknown. The 
subjects of the analogy are theAvorks of man, a watch, a code 
of laws, or any other human contrivance, on the one hand ; 
and the phenomena of Nature on the other. The former, 
the watch, &c, arc known to have been designed by the 
human designer, man; the latter, the phenomena of Nature, 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



45 



are inferred analogically to have been designed by the un- 
known, but sought, Designer, God. 

" Well, it appears to me that an analogy to be good for 
demonstration must be extensible, at least in its essence, 
equally to both of the terms of the analogy. Now, man, the 
known designer, invents or designs by discovering laws 
external to and independent of himself, and then applying 
these laws to the sure production of effects which he 
desiderates. (Black discovers latent heat, Watt applies that 
discovery in a desiderated direction, and the steam-engine is 
brought to perfection.) Therefore the unknown Designer, 
who is inferred by this analogy, does, for all the analogy 
makes good, simply discover truth external to and inde- 
pendent of Himself, and then applies that truth to the pro- 
duction of effects (the phenomena of Nature), which He 
desiderates. This is not God, the eternal, almighty, and 
every way infinite One, whose existence the argument pro- 
fesses to demonstrate." 

The argument from reason maintained in the preceding 
pages, may no doubt fall short of this demonstration ; but 
it appears to me that the supernatural Designer does much 
more than, like man, invent or design by discovering laws 
external to and independent of Himself. The bodies of the 
mammalia are composed of certain chemical elements ; and 
out of these, the unknown Designer has formed different 
organisms, which manifest very different qualities. The 
tiger and the lamb, the horse and the owl, man and the ape, 
are all composed, so far as we have yet discovered, of these 
ten or twelve elements. We have found out many of the 
laws which the elements obey in entering into combinations, 
and are able to produce from them many admirable new re- 
sults ; but w T e have never been able to convert them by any 
skill of our own into organised beings ; much less to make 
those specific combinations of them which constitute dif- 
ferent organisms, capable of manifesting different qualities. 



4u 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. m. 



The unknown Designer appears to encounter no such 
difficulties. The specified elements, when wielded by Him, 
take every variety of form, and manifest the most diverse 
qualities. Nay, He endows the structures with powers to 
be exerted contingently— powers which are ready to act 
when circumstances require their action, or to remain latent 
for ever. The blood of animals, for example, has the 
quality of repairing losses and injuries which may be sus- 
tained by their organisms : so that if a muscle is injured, it 
shall deposit muscular fibre, and if a bone is broken, it shall 
deposit osseous matter, in the places and quantities necessary 
to restore the parts to health and efficiency. But life may 
be passed without these parts sustaining any injury ; and in 
this case the powers are never evoked into action. These 
phenomena indicate to Comparison and Causality that the 
unknown Contriver possessed over the elements He used 
a command indescribably superior to that which we can 
wield . 

Again, man has in vain attempted to produce a per- 
petual motion ; but the supernatural Power appears to have 
found no difficulty in doing so. The revolution of the 
planets round the sun, and of the satellites round their 
principal planets, are examples in point. We comprehend 
the laws which govern these evolutions, and see uniformity 
and design manifested in them, but we cannot even conjec- 
ture how 7 the planets were formed, and how their powers of 
motion were communicated to them. The only inference 
we can legitimately draw appears to me to be that intel- 
ligence and power produced these stupendous phenomena, 
and that the Author of them is not a mere analogue of 
human power and intelligence, but that He deals with 
matter as its Master. When we see things done with matter 
which man in vain attempts to accomplish, it seems a 
logical inference that the unknown Author of the things 
is not, like man, a mere worker on materials possessing 



chap, in.] 



OF GOD. 



47 



properties which He cannot change, but one who, in a far 
higher degree, and to an extent unknown to us, commands 
their very essence, and applies them according to His will. 
We cannot discover limits to this power in the un- 
known Designer. 

It has been objected, that although our intuitive percep- 
tions, and also inferences drawn by Causality and Compari- 
son may lead us to believe that God has existed, we see no 
evidence that He now exists. I reply that the manifestations 
of His agency, power, wisdom, and goodness, continue to be 
presented to us every moment, and that we have no data 
for concluding that the cause has ceased, while the effects 
continue. 

This argument does not profess to demonstrate all the 
attributes of God, but only His existence and such of His 
attributes as our limited faculties are capable of compre- 
hending. Our notions of the latter will be constantly 
augmented in number, and will rise in. sublimity, in pro- 
portion to our advance in correct knowledge of their mani- 
festations in Nature. At present, we have scarcely started 
in our career of dis cover y of these, because hitherto we have 
wanted the grand element necessary to comprehend G d's 
mode of governing the most important departments of this 
world : viz., knowledge of the means by which moral phe- 
nomena are produced and regulated. 

Dr. Vimont remarks that we cannot fully comprehend 
God without being His equal : just as a dog cannot compre- 
hend the human mind, in consequence of its utter want of 
several of the human faculties. And Hobbes, in his " Treatise 
on Human Nature,' 3 observes : " Forasmuch as God Almighty 
is incomprehensible, it followeth that we can have no con- 
ception or image of the Deity : and consequently, all His 
attributes signify our inability and defect of power to con- 
ceive anything concerning His nature, and not any 
conception of the same, except only this, That there is a 



43 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. in. 



God. Thus all that will consider may know that God is, 

though not what He is." 

The impossibility of the human faculties fully compre- 
hending God has forced itself on some of the great minds 
who attempted to describe the Deity in Scripture. The 
definition of Him as "I Am' 3 assumes that all is implied in 
the simple fact of His existence ; and the question, " Canst 
thou by searching find out God ? canst thou find out the 
Almighty unto perfection 1 " coincides with the views now 
suggested. 

If our capacity to comprehend God is thus limited, all 
discussions about the manner in which He exists must be 
futile, and to my mind they are highly irreverent. Locke 
defines " a person n to be " a thinking, intelligent being, that 
has reason and reflection, and considers itself as itself, the 
same thinking thing in different times and places." In this 
sense of the word our intellectual faculties lead us to assign 
a personal character to the Deity, although we can form no 
well-grounded notions concerning His form, His substance, 
His size, or His mode of living. 

An article in the Edinburgh Review, generally ascribed 
to Professor Sedgwick, expresses a similar view : — 

" What know we," says he, " of the God of Nature (we speak 
only of natural means), except through the faculties He has given 
us rightly employed on the materials around us'? In this way we 
rise to a conception of material inorganic laws, in heautif ul harmony 
and adjustment ; and they suggest to us the conception of infinite 
power and wisdom. In like manner, we rise to a conception of 
organic laws — of means (often almost purely mechanical, as they 
seem to us, and their organic functions well comprehended) 
adapted to an end — and that end the well-being of a creature 
endowed with sensation and volition. Thus we rise to a conception 
both of Divine power and Divine goodness ; and we are constrained 
to "believe, not merely that all material law is subordinate to His 
will, but that He has also (in a way He allows us to see His works) 



CHAP. III.] 



OF GOD. 



49 



so exhibited the attributes of His will, as to show Himself to the 
mind of man as a personal and superintending God, concentrating 
His will on every atom of the universe." (Vol. LXXXII., p. 62.) 

It is believed by many tint we owe our knowledge of 
the existence of God to the Bible ; but this is a mistake, 
for it commences with expressions which obviously assume 
His existence as a recognised fact. 

Instead of vainly attempting to define so sacred an 
object as God, and one so far transcending our power of 
comprehension, let us inquire into the manifestations of His 
will presented to us in Xature. 



E 



50 



CHAPTER IV. 

The Government of the Physical and Moral 
Worlds. 

section i. — the government of the physical world. 

All matter appears to exert force. The particles of the 
diamond cohere with so intense an energy, that it requires 
great mechanical power to separate them. The mountains 
seem inert, but they are constantly pressing downwards 
towards the centre of the earth. Water slumbering peace- 
fully in the bosom of a lake is exerting a pressure on the 
bottom and sides, and is, in fact, operating with a force 
similar to that which it manifests in rushing over the 
precipice. In the latter case we perceive the force only 
because there is no counter-balancing resistance to arrest 
its action. 

Further, the forces of different substances act on each 
other, and produce important results. Oxygen acting on 
sulphur, in certain circumstances, combines with it and 
produces sulphuric acid : a highly corrosive liquid. Under 
the influence of heat, the same gas combines with carbon, 
and produces a gas destructive of animal life. If this 
reciprocal action of corporeal substances were indefinite and 
unlimited, the physical world, apparently, might lapse into 
confusion, chaos might come again, and the earth could 
afford no abiding place for animated beings. How is this 
result obviated? And by what means are order in the 
arrangements and regularity in the evolutions of matter 
preserved ? 



chap, iv.] GOVERNMENT OF THE PHYSICAL WORLD. 51 

Eacli elementary substance manifests the tendency to 
undergo changes, and to act on other substances, only in 
certain ways and under certain conditions. The formation 
of crystals, and the cohesion of the particles of a liquid 
metal on cooling, are examples of the tendency of elements 
of the same kind to combine with each other in a specific 
manner ; while the combination of different chemical 
elements, always in certain definite proportions, in con- 
stituting a new compound, is an example of the regulation 
of the powers of distinct substances in acting on each 
other. 

By investing the elements of matter with definite 
tendencies, and subjecting them to definite restraints, God 
appears to have made a provision for the maintenance of 
order and regularity in physical nature which commends 
itself to the human intellect as simple and efficacious, and 
to our sentiments as admirable and exquisitely beautiful. 
After perceiving it, we are able to contemplate the ceaseless 
changes proceeding in the material world without appre- 
hensions of confusion. The rocks are riven by the lightning, 
worn by the flood, or disintegrated by the frost, and their 
particles are swept into the sea ; but other regulated forces 
are there forming new combinations of them, and new rocks, 
similar to the old, will in future time emerge from the 
deep. 

The Divine government of the physical world thus 
becomes manifest to us through the perception of order and 
regularity in the action of matter ; and the means by which 
it is accomplished appear to be the endowing of these with 
definite forces, and enabling them to act on each other in 
definite modes alone. As our faculties cannot penetrate 
behind the screen of matter, we can study the method of 
the Divine government only in the means by which it is 
conducted ; and under this view, science is an exposition of 
the order of Providence in governing the world. Every 



52 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. IV. 



action of matter is a manifestation of Divine power, and 
when it is so regarded, is calculated to challenge the highest 
reverence of our emotional faculties. 

Astronomy, Chemistry, and the other physical sciences 
unfold to us the forces and arrangements through which the 
changes of the seasons, the fertility of the soil, and the food 
of man and animals are produced. Famine and overflowing 
abundance, with all their physiological and moral conse- 
quences, are the results of the action of these forces ; and 
we must extend our knowledge of them, and adapt our 
conduct to their operation, if we desire to understand and to 
conform to the Divine government. 

Physics, or Natural Philosophy, consists of a description 
of the manner, so far as man has discovered it, in which the 
stupendous universe of suns and worlds, stretching beyond 
the scope even of our imaginations, is bound together and 
regulated ; and mechanical science is an exposition of the 
conditions under which God has enabled us to control and 
apply many of the powers of Nature. The forces of matter 
act in the same circumstances with so much regularity and 
precision, that we are able to employ even mathematical 
proportions as means of measuring and calculating their 
effects. 

In investigating physical forces and their relations and 
consequences, we may employ the intellectual faculties 
exclusively ; and in this case our observations and con- 
clusions are scientific in their character. The moral and 
religious emotions not being engaged in the investigation, 
there is nothing directly moral or religious in the knowledge 
which constitutes pure physical science. It is advantageous 
that science should be thus cultivated for its own advance- 
ment, because excited emotions disturb and often mislead 
the intellect. But from the teacher's desk, from the moral 
and religious chairs of our universities, and from our pulpits, 
the intellect and the moral and religious sentiments shoulcj 



chap, iv.] GOVERNMENT OF TEE MORAL WORLD. 53 

act together in teaching the truths of science as expositions 
of the means by which God governs the world. 

These sentiments would give to the intellectual instruc- 
tion that exciting and hallowing influence which is indis- 
pensable to excite reverence at once for the Euler of the 
world and for the means by which His government is 
conducted. It is difficult to perceive how otherwise the aid 
of the religious emotions can be obtained towards leading 
men seriously to regulate their conduct in conformity to 
the order of Nature. Religion and science have never been 
thus systematically combined in the general instruction of 
the people ; and hence the barrenness of science in moral 
and religious fruits, and of religion in the practical advance- 
ment of secular well-being. 

Divine government, then, is conspicuous in every well- 
understood department of physical nature, and seems to be 
effected by endowing physical substances with definite pro- 
perties ; and the evidences of this government, of the mode in 
tvhich it is administered, and of the laics by which it is 
maintained, will become more and more clear and comjrrehen- 
sible in proportion to the exactness of our knowledge of the 
objects through the instrumentality of which it is accom- 
plished. It is only where we are altogether ignorant of the 
causes of phenomena, or where our knowledge of them is 
vague and general, that confusion appears to reign ; while 
intimate knowledge constantly reveals order and harmony. 

SECTION II. — THE GOVERNMENT OF THE MORAL WOELD. 

By the government of the moral world, I mean the 
regulation of the phenomena exhibited by conscious and 
intelligent beings. AYe may first consider the case of the 
lower animals. Order and law appear to govern in the 
highest degree their production and action. They are all 
composed of the same chemical elements, but the most 
rigid restrictions have been placed on the manner and 



54 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAP. IV. 



conditions under which these shall combine in forming 
each species of animal. 

Man has not succeeded in imitating these combinations, 
and has not been able to manufacture a living organism. 
How are the characteristics of each species of animated 
beings instituted and preserved, so as to render each per- 
manent, without any one of them changing its nature, and 
without the possibility of their generally amalgamating, 
and thus producing monstrosities, ending in ultimate and 
universal confusion 1 Apparently, by imposing impassable 
restraints on the action of the atoms of matter, when com- 
bining to form their organisms. The sheep and the wolf 
cannot combine their blood and qualities by propagation ; 
and although the horse and the ass produce the mule, 
which appears an exception, it cannot continue its own race. 
Here, then, law and order are conspicuous. 

When the animal is produced, its unconscious and 
conscious actions are equally regulated. Each species finds 
itself in circumstances in which external things are adapted 
to its organism — the water to the fish, the land to the 
quadruped, and the air to the bird. Each species possesses 
an apparatus for breathing, and the air is found to be 
adapted to all : each has digestive organs, and peculiar 
food related to these organs is provided for each variety — 
grass for the ox and sheep, and flesh for the tiger and lion. 

Ascending to their conscious actions, we find the swallow 
inspired with the inclination and capacity to build its nest, 
the beaver its hut, and the bee its cells, with unerring 
precision; while the fox practises cunning, and the cock 
manifests courage, without experience or instruction. 

Directing our attention still upwards, we find the very 
existence of the different species of the lower animals 
placed under regulations. At a meeting of the British 
Association for the Advancement of Science (in 1856), Sir 
William Jardine read a communication on the progress of 



chap, nr.] GOVERNMENT OF THE MORAL WORLD. 55 



the artificial propagation of salmon in the Tay : a subject on 
which he was specially authorised to report by the Associa- 
tion. In the course of his remarks, Sir William is reported 
to have stated, "that it has been found that one of the 
worst enemies of the salmon ova in the breeding-beds is the 
larvae of the May-fly, a creature which, in its turn, was 
preyed upon by the common river trout. Xow, the practice 
had prevailed in rivers preserved for salmon-fishing of 
destroying trout, though this fact showed that the numbers 
of trouts ought not to be unduly diminished, as by keep- 
ing down the May-fly they aided in propagating salmon. 
As an illustration of this law of Nature, he pointed out that 
in parts of the country in which hawks had been ruthlessly 
extirpated, with the object of encouraging the breed of game, 
wood-pigeons had increased to such an extent as to have 
become a positive nuisance, and most injurious to the 
farmer; and he showed the danger incurred by unduly inter- 
fering with the balance established by Xature among wild 
animals" 

How, then, are these specific qualities and powers of 
action, these adaptations, restrictions, and reciprocal checks, 
through which universal order is instituted and preserved 
among beings destitute of reason, and unconscious of the 
place and duties allotted to them in the world — produced '? 
It appears to me that this is accomplished by the endow- 
ment of the material elements of which they are composed, 
with specific powers of action, and by placing every one of 
these under restraints which it cannot surmount. It is in 
the organisms of the animals that we find the instruments 
of the Divine government of their actions revealed, and it is 
through the study of the qualities of these instruments that 
we discover the laws of this government. 

Stupendous and admirable as these examples of Divine 
government are, our dogmatic religion not only ignores 
them, but excludes their being converted into religious 



56 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. iv. 

truths by association with our religious emotions, Although 
the natural history of animals is taught meagrely in a few 
schools, and more largely in our universities, it is the 
physical appearance and habit of the different species that 
form the grand elements of this instruction : the view now 
given of these as examples of the Divine government on 
earth is omitted, and by many persons it is objected to as 
disguised infidelity or as a new religion. If the young 
were taught to perceive and comprehend the prevalence of 
law and order in the government of the inferior races, and 
to view this as a manifestation of the power and wisdom of 
God, it would greatly augment the interest with which they 
would study the physical and organic qualities and actions 
of the creatures : and it would also prepare their minds for 
the all-important truth that man is placed under a similar 
regime himself. The evidence of this fact shall form the 
next subject of our consideration. 

By the moral government of the world in relation to 
man is meant the control and direction maintained by the 
Divine Ruler over human actions, by means of which He 
leads individuals and the race to fulfil the objects for which 
He instituted them. The problem is to discover the reality 
of this government ; and this may perhaps be best accom- 
plished by considering the manner in which it is accom- 
plished. As previously observed, our ancestors in the 
seventeenth century believed this government to be con- 
ducted by special acts of supernatural interference on the 
part of God with human affairs. Science has banished this 
idea, and lias substituted in its place the notion that the 
moral world also is governed by natural laws ; but it has 
made small progress in unfolding what these laws are, and 
how they operate. 

The consequence is that at this moment the great body 
of the people have no serious or practical conviction that 



chap, iv.] GOVERNMENT OF THE MORAL WORLD. hi 



such a government exists ; and that even enlightened men 
have no systematic or self-consistent notions concerning the 
mode in which it is conducted. They acknowledge in 
words that there is a Divine government in the moral as 
well as in the physical world, and that it is by natural 
laws ; but here they have stopped, and most of them are 
silent concerning the mode of that government. In conse- 
quence of the exclusion, effected by science, of the notion 
that special acts of Divine interference now take place in 
human affairs, the religious teaching founded on that prin- 
ciple has become effete. It has not been formally given up, 
but it is no longer of practical efficacy. Hence we are at 
this moment really a people without any acknowledged, 
self-consistent, satisfactory, or practical notions concerning 
the moral government of the world — in other words, con- 
cerning the order of God's providence in governing the 
condition and actions of men, and educing from them the 
results which He designed. 

How is this deficiency to be supplied ? Apparently in 
the same manner in which we have supplied other defects 
of our knowledge of the order of God's providence in the 
physical and organic kingdoms. Do we know intimately 
the machinery by means of which the government of the 
moral world is maintained and conducted? The answer 
must be in the negative. Have we applied such science of 
the body as we possess to guide us in discovering the 
principles on which health, disease, and death are dispensed 
to man 1 Have we any science of mind resembling in 
precision, minuteness, and certainty the sciences of astro- 
nomy and chemistry ! Monsieur de Bona Id, in words 
quoted by Mr. Dugald Stewart, answers the question. 
"The diversity of doctrines," says he, "has increased from 
age to age with the number of masters and with the 
progress of knowledge ; and Europe, which at present 
possesses libraries filled with philosophical works, and 



58 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. IV. 



which, reckons up almost as many philosophers as writers ; 
poor in the midst of so much wealth, and uncertain, with 
the aid of all its guides, which road it should follow — 
Europe, the centre and focus of all the lights of the world, 
has yet its philosophy only in expectation. 5 '* 

If the science of mind is as necessary to our understand- 
ing the manner in which the Divine government of human 
actions is conducted as is the science of matter to our com- 
prehending the order of that government in the physical 
world, and if Monsieur de Bonald's description of the con- 
dition of mental science be correct, there is no cause for 
surprise at the darkness which envelopes us in regard to 
the government of the moral world. 

Let me ask, Why should we be so deeply in the dark 
concerning the laws according to which life, health, talents, 
dispositions, and individual and social happiness are dis- 
pensed to man % This question may perhaps be answered 
by asking others. Do we know intimately the causes which 
produce health and disease ? The laws of action of these 
may regulate the endurance of life. Do we know the 
causes which give rise to the different dispositions and 
capacities of men ? The degrees in which these causes are 
combined may be eminently influential in determining 
individual endowments. Do we know the precise social 
effects which these dispositions and capacities are fitted, in 
the case of each person, to produce when permitted to act 
blindly, to act under false or imperfect information, or to 
act under a clear and correct knowledge of the real nature 
and relations of things 1 

On the extent of this knowledge may depend our 
capacity to discern the causes of social happiness or social 
misery, and to augment or to diminish our own share of 

* ' ' Recherches Philosophiques,''p. 59 ; quoted in Stewart's Prelim- 
inary Dissertation to the "Encyclopaedia Britannica," Vol. I., p. 230. 



chap, iv.] GOVERNMENT OF THE MORAL WORLD. 59 

them. Do we know whether these causes and effects, 
whatever they may be, are to any extent subject to human 
control ; and if so, how we may control them ? If they are 
not subject to man's jurisdiction, do we know whether he 
has it in his power to modify, in any degree, his own con- 
duct, in relation to their agency, so as to diminish the evil 
or increase the good which they are calculated to produce % 

To nearly all of these questions only a negative answer 
can be given ; and I suspect that in this ignorance lies the 
grand obstacle to the discovery of the mode in which God 
governs the moral world. 



CO 



CHAPTER V. 

Life and Death. 

Life and health arc the foundations of human well-being 
on earth ; and Death is perhaps the most solemn and 
momentous subject which can engage the consideration of 
man. According to the dogmas of most of the religious 
sects of Christendom, it is a penalty inflicted by God on all 
mankind for Adam's first transgression ; and it is also the 
awful portal through which we are ushered into everlasting 
happiness or into everlasting misery. According to this 
view, death is a dire calamity, which we must submit to with 
all the patience and resignation we can command, hoping 
for heaven as a solace under its pressure, and as a refuge 
from its terrors. According to the prevalent dogmas, how- 
ever, these consolations are reserved only for the true 
believers of each sect ; the adherents of the other sects — 
those who believe in "soul-destroying errors"— and also 
all mankind who have not known Christianity, or who have 
not believed that interpretation of it which each sect holds 
to lead to salvation — being doomed inexorably to death on 
earth, and to never-ceasing misery hereafter. 

At the time when these view r s were framed into dogmas, 
and were woven into the core of the religious emotions of 
Europe as Divine truths, there was no science of geology 
revealing the condition of the earth and its inhabitants 
during millions of years before man appeared ; no science 
of chemistry unfolding the elements of which man is com- 
posed, and their relations to the things of this life ; no 
science of physiology indicating the structure, functions, 



CHxVP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



61 



and relations of the different parts of the organism of man, 
and showing their peculiar adaptation to this world. When 
we contemplate the facts brought to light in these sciences, 
we discover that death was an institution of Nature, reign- 
ing among the inhabitants of the earth through countless 
ages before the existence of man ; that there is a general 
resemblance between his structure and theirs ; that his 
organism is constituted to receive its origin from previously 
existing organisms, to increase by assimilating the chemical 
elements of organised bodies with its own tissues, to reach 
maturity, then to decay, and finally to die ; death being the 
resolution of its parts into their original elements. 

According to the lights of science, therefore, death is an 
institution of Nature ; and this conclusion becomes more 
certain in proportion to our advance in knowledge of man's 
constitution, of that of external objects, and of the relations 
established between them. 

Here, then, is a conflict between the prevailing dogmas 
of Christendom and science. Death viewed as a penalty is 
an incubus, a terror, and an affliction, calculated to darken 
the whole of life ; and to those whose self-appreciation is 
governed by conscientiousness, who can discover no reason 
why they should have been elected from all eternity to enter in 
at the straight gate, while countless millions of their fellow- 
creatures, equal, and some of them superior, to themselves 
in every estimable quality, should have been consigned to 
never-ending suffering— to such minds the dogmatic sequel 
to death unspeakably augments its terrors. The grand 
remedy presented by each sect for this overwhelming evil, 
which it has conjured into existence, is belief in its own 
dogmas \ and, according to them, no ray of consolation can 
be derived from any other source. 

Viewed as a natural institution, death wears a different 
aspect. When we investigate the organism of man, we find 
it constituted in harmony with death. Organs of D est rue- 



62 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



tiveness enable us, when in full health and actively em- 
ployed, to live amidst the daily extinction of animal and 
human life without finding it appalling and overwhelming. 
We enjoy repasts composed of the flesh of dead animals, 
and are gay and joyous over them. By the appointment of 
Nature, they nourish us and replenish us with vigour to 
discharge our moral and intellectual duties. In a state of 
health we pass funerals in the streets, and look at the 
array, rarely stopping in our career of business or pleasure 
to moralise on the uncertainty of life. 

The dogmas represent this indifference as sin ; science 
regards it as the adaptation of our mental faculties to the 
circumstances in which they are destined to act. Nature 
prevails, and man in health and activity rarely thinks of 
death with fear. The pulpit often recalls it to our recollec- 
tion • but, guided by dogmas which contradict Nature, the 
preacher only invests it with unauthorised terror, and by 
misdirecting our understandings, allows it to afflict us with 
evils which, under a system of sounder instruction, might 
be avoided. He discourses largely of death as the prelude 
to a day of terrible retribution ; but he is silent as to the 
causes of its premature occurrence, which, by separating 
husband and wife in the prime of life and in the full tide of 
domestic felicity, inflicts the deepest anguish on human 
affection ; or, by removing children in the dawn of their 
existence, spreads desolation in the parental bosom ; or, by 
cutting short the career of genius, or of manly vigour in its 
zenith, deprives society of all that the possessors of these 
gifts might have contributed to its welfare. 

These constitute the grand evils of death, and they are 
to a great extent avoidable ; yet the preacher chants dirges 
over their occurrence, points to them as the punishment of 
sin, and refuses to recognise them as the temporal conse- 
quences of the infraction of the laws of health which, being 
of Divine origin, it is his bounden duty to teach and enforce— 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



63 



while he calumniates as infidels those who attempt to shed 
light on so anomalous a state of things. To this line of con- 
duct, there are, no doubt, admirable exceptions, worthy of all 
reverence and sympathy ; but I speak of the general style 
of preaching the dogmas of Christendom from the pulpit. 
One legitimate office of the pulpit, in relation to this sub- 
ject, appears to me to be to warn us of our liability, by 
infringement of the laws of health, to bring upon ourselves 
the terrible sufferings that naturally accompany disease 
and produce premature death, and to teach us that it is a 
religious duty to study those laws, and to obey them. 

As we proceed in our scientific investigations, we dis- 
cover that the human organism, when soundly constituted 
at birth, and when placed in normal circumstances during 
life, is framed to act without pain or suffering for seventy 
years at least ; that after fifty a process of insensible decay 
commences, accompanied by changes in our feelings and 
desires preparing us for death ; and that when the extreme 
of life is reached, the harmony between our desires and 
death is complete. We do not then find death to be either 
a penalty or a calamity. 

Viewed as an institution, death is obviously the means 
through which, in a world of limited space, the exquisite 
enjoyments of love between the sexes and parental affec- 
tion are provided for ; and it is through death that the 
errors, prejudices, and obstructions which impede the 
civilisation and enjoyment of the race are removed, by 
introducing the young, ingenuous, and enterprising to 
mount higher and higher in the path of improvement. 
Regarded in this light, and deprived of its penal and por- 
tentous character, death is bereft of its most formidable 
features. 

We of this generation, into whose minds its terrible 
aspects have been deeply engraven by our spiritual in- 
structors, can scarcely form a correct idea of the light in 



64 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



which it will appear to those who shall have been taught 
from infancy to regard it as an institution of God, not 
intended for our affliction, but a necessary element in His 
plan of government, and accompanied by innumerable 
advantages to ourselves, and, at the natural close of life, 
deprived of its terrors by the accommodation of our feelings 
to its approach. 

The dogmas of theologians derive their chief support 
from the facts that death is instinctively dreaded by most 
people, and that it is sometimes the cause of the deepest 
afflictions that darken the lot of man. How, then, shall we 
reconcile these facts with the notion of death being a bene- 
ficent institution] The explanation appears to me to be 
this— It is death in youth and middle age that wears these 
aspects, and is attended with these sufferings ; but such 
deaths are not natural institutions, but are accidents arising 
from human ignorance and regardlessness of God's laws. 
We have been endowed with intelligence to discover oar 
position on earth, and the duties it requires of us ; and in 
proportion as we shall adequately comprehend the one and 
fulfil the other, we shall find premature death and its 
general precursors, disease and pain, gradually dimin- 
ishing. 

So far as can at present be discerned, however, we cannot 
foretell the ultimate cessation of evil on earth ■ the power in 
our organism to repair casual injuries, and our faculties of 
Combativeness, Destructiveness, Cautiousness, and Secre- 
tiveness, appear to be constituted in direct relation to a 
world in which there shall always be a liability to evil; 
but, on the other hand, our moral and intellectual endow- 
ments, by giving the desire and capacity for progressive 
improvement, seem to indicate that advance in happiness is 
not only possible, but is part of the plan of our being. Let 
us, then, investigate the cause of disease and premature 
death, and try to discover in what circumstances they 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



65 



occur, and what character they bear in the moral govern- 
ment of the world. 

From an attentive study of our constitution, it appears 
that the Divine Ruler has conferred on man a system of 
organs of respiration, a heart and blood-vessels, a stomach 
and other organs of nutrition, and so forth ; that to each of 
these He has given a definite constitution ; and that He 
has appointed definite relations between each of them and 
all the others, and between each of them and the objects of 
external nature : and I now add that experience teaches us 
that life and health accompany the normal and harmonious 
action of the ivhole ; while disease, pain, and premature 
death are the consequences of their disproportionate and 
abnormal action. 

The study of the structure, functions, relations, and laws 
of these organs, then, appears to me to be the true mode of 
investigating the principles according to which God dispenses 
life, health, disease, and death in this world; in other 
words, the mode in which He governs in this department of 
creation* This view becomes more reasonable when we 
consider that hitherto there has not been discovered in 
Nature any institution the ultimate object of which is to 
produce evil ; that all known natural institutions appear to 
be calculated to produce a preponderance of good ; and that 
God has given us faculties which enable us, within certain 
limits, to observe, understand, and act according to the 
laws which regulate the forces that most directly affect our 
well-being. 

Let us endeavour, then, to bring this idea to the test of 
observation and reason. With this view we may select the 
duration of life as the first subject of our consideration. 

* In presenting this idea, my late brother, Dr. Andrew Combe, was 
my constant coadjutor and guide. 
F 



66 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



It is beyond the compass of our faculties to discover 
why the world was constituted such as it is • but we must 
take the facts of Nature as they exist, and conclude that 
death in old age cannot be prevented by human intelli- 
gence and power. But that the duration of life, within 
prescribed limits, is subject to human influence appears 
undeniable. That it depends on regularly operating causes 
is rendered obvious by the records of mortality. The 
registers of burials kept in the different countries of 
Europe present striking examples of uniformity in the 
number of deaths that occur at the same ages in different 
years. So constant are these results while the circum- 
stances of any country continue the same, that it is possible 
to predict, with nearly perfect certainty, that in England 
and Wales, of 1,000 persons between the ages of twenty 
and thirty, living on the 1st day of January in any one 
year, ten will die before the 1st day of January in the 
next year.* 

Uniformity in the numbers of events bespeaks uni- 
formity in the causes which produce them ; and uniformity 
in causes and effects is the fundamental idea of government. 
If, then, these deaths do not occur arbitrarily or fortuitously, 
but result from regularly operating causes, the following 
questions present themselves : — Are these causes dis- 
coverable by human intelligence ? If they are, can that 

* I have selected the example of deaths from ages between twenty 
and thirty, because, as will afterwards be shown, during this interval 
the conditions of life seem to be, to a great extent, under human 
control. In later periods — from seventy to eighty, or eighty to 
ninety — they are not so. The human frame then obeys the law of 
its constitution — it decays and dies ; but it does so under no in- 
scrutable law. The causes of its decay are palpable, and the effects 
are obviously designed. The sufferer has. then, no duty but sub- 
mission to the will of the Being who gratuitously conferred life 
on him at first, and w r ho is entitled to withdraw it when the objects 
for which it was given have been accomplished. 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AXD DEATH. 



r,7 



intelligence modify them ? If not, can we adapt our conduct 
to their operation so as to influence their effects \ These 
questions are important equally in a religious and in a 
practical point of view. If the causes are constant and 
inscrutable, and if their action is irresistible, it follows that, 
in regard to death, we are subject to a sublime and mys- 
terious fatalism : in short, that the Mahommedan doctrine 
on this subject is true. If on the 1st day of January in 
any one year 1,000 youths, in the vigorous period of life, 
know, with nearly positive certainty, that ere the clock 
strikes twelve on the night of the 31st of December, ten 
of their number will be lifeless corpses ; and if, never- 
theless, not one of them is able to discover who are to be 
the victims, or to employ any precautions to avert the blow 
from himself, what is this but being subject to a real 
fatalism 1 

If, on the other hand, the causes are discoverable, and 
if those subject to their influence possess also the power of 
modifying them, or of accommodating their own conduct 
to their action, and thereby of changing their influence on 
their own condition for good or for evil, Divine government 
will not only be discerned in the event, but that government 
will present a widely different aspect. Instead of a course 
of mysterious fatalism, it will be a system of causation, 
regular in its action, serutable in its principles, designedly 
adapted to the physical, moral, and intellectual nature of 
man, and as such, presented to him for the cognisance of 
his intellect, the respect of his moral feelings, and the 
practical guidance of his conduct. In discovering the 
causes of the ten deaths, and their modes of operation, 
we shall acquire a knowledge of the principles on which 
God administers life and death to men at the age between 
twenty and thirty ; we shall obtain a glimpse of the order 
of God's secular providence in this department of His 
kingdom. If this view is erroneous, there appears to be 



68 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



no alternative to the conclusion that, in regard to life and 
death, we are the subjects of a despotic fatalism. 

Let us inquire, then, whether the causes are scrutable, 
and whether human power is capable of modifying their 
influence. 

If, for instance, we desire to know by what laws God 
governs the sense of hearing— that is to say, under what 
conditions He bestows this boon upon us, and continues it 
with us — we shall best succeed by studying the structure 
and modes of action of the ear, and by examining its 
relations to the air, to the constitution of sonorous bodies, 
to the brain, and also to the digestive, respiratory, and 
circulating systems of the body, on the action of which 
the sense of hearing indirectly depends. It is no abuse of 
language to say that, in studying those details we shall 
be studying the conditions under which, within certain 
limits, we may retain, forfeit, improve, or impair the sense 
of hearing pretty much at our discretion. In the structure, 
the functions, and the relations of the ear, we shall discern 
the manifestations of God's power and goodness, and a 
clear exposition of the principles on which He administers 
this sense. In the means by which we are permitted, 
within certain limits, to destroy or to preserve, to impair 
or to invigorate our hearing, we shall discover that His 
government is not a despotism or a fatalism, but is a 
system of regular causation adapted to our constitution 
and condition, and is presented to us for the investigation 
of our intelligence and the guidance of our conduct. 

In the constitution of the sense, and in the appointment 
of its relations, which man cannot alter, God's sovereignty 
is made apparent. By connecting certain beneficial con- 
sequences with the actions done in accordance with that 
constitution and those relations, and certain painful con- 
sequences with actions done in discordance with them — 
which consequences also man cannot alter— the Divine 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



Ruler preserves His own sway over the sense, and over 
all who possess it ; while, by His endowing man with 
intellect capable of discovering that constitution and its 
relations, with religious emotions enabling him to respect 
it, and with power, within certain limits, to act in accord- 
ance or discordance with it, and thereby to command the 
favourable or the adverse results at his own pleasure, 
human freedom is established and guaranteed. 

Man thus appears as a moral, religious, and intelligent 
being, studying the will of his Creator in His works, 
worshipping Him by conforming to His laws, and reaping 
the rich rewards of enjoyment destined to him as the 
consequences of his fulfilling the objects of his being. By 
those means the Divine government is maintained simul- 
taneously with man's freedom. 

The same remarks may be made in regard to all the other 
parts of the human organism ; and it seems to follow that 
God has revealed to man the laws according to which He 
dispenses life and health, and has actually invited him to 
take a moral and intelligent part in acting out the scheme 
of His providence for his own advantage. 

The practical conclusion which I draw from these 
considerations is, that an intelligent man who knew the 
structure, the functions, and the laws of health of the vital 
organs of the human body— the quality (i.e., whether strong 
or weak, sound or diseased) of the constitution which each 
of the thousand persons had inherited from his progenitors 
— and the moral and physical influences to which each would 
be subjected, could predict, with a great approximation to 
accuracy, which of the thousand would die within the 
year. If so, the ten deaths in the thousand, which, in the 
present circumstances of social life, appear like the result 
of a fatal decree, would become merely the exponent of the 
number of individuals in whose persons the conditions of 
health and life had de facto been so far infringed as to 



70 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chip. v. 



produce the result under consideration ; without necessarily 
implying either that these conditions are in themselves 
inscrutable, or that the course of action which violates them 
is unavoidable. The sway of fatalism would disappear, and 
in its place a government calculated to serve as a guide 
to the conduct of moral and intelligent beings would be 
revealed— a government of which causation, regular in its 
action, certain in its effects, and scrutable in its forms, 
would constitute the foundation. 

Moreover, it would follow that, in the administration 
of God's secular providence in consigning ten individuals 
out of a thousand to the grave, and leaving nine hundred 
and ninety alive, as little of favouritism as of fatalism is to 
be discovered. The only sentence that each man would find 
recorded regarding himself would be, that he must either 
fulfil the conditions of health, or suffer the consequences of 
infringing them. 

It may be objected that it is impossible for any one 
individual to acquire all the requisite information ; but 
this is foreign to the question. The real point at issue is 
whether such knowledge exists and is necessary to our well- 
being during life. If it is necessary, we must teach it in 
schools and from the pulpit as Divine truth, and must 
train the young and counsel the adult to act on it in their 
habitual conduct. 

The greatest obstacle to this consummation is found in 
the difficulty of persuading the public mind that this know- 
ledge is Divine truth, and that the practice of it is a religious 
duty. One cause of this difficulty appears to consist in 
certain erroneous notions concerning the nature and object 
of the sufferings which attend infractions of the laws of 
Nature. The inflictions under. human laws have no natural, 
and therefore no necessary, relation to the offence they 
punish ; there is no natural relation, for exauqDle, between 
stealing and mounting the steps of a treadmill. When, 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



71 



therefore, it is asserted that under the Divine government a 
man, by infringing the laws of health, may incur disease 
and pain, and may bring himself to a premature grave, 
many regard this as teaching that the result is & punishment 
in the strict sense of the word — namely, an infliction im- 
posed in vengeance of a crime ; and when they think of 
their own deficient instruction, and of the difficulties in 
learning and obeying the laws of health, they are shocked 
by the idea of their being punished for this ignorance. 
But the difficulty disappears if we say suffering instead 
of punishment^ meaning thereby the natural evil which 
follows the breach of every physical, organic, and moral 
law. 

I regard the natural consequence of the infraction, not 
only as inevitable, but as pre-ordained by God, for a purpose ; 
and that purpose appears to me to be to deter intelligent 
beings from infringing the laws instituted by Him for their 
welfare, and to preserve order in the world. Most people, 
when they think of physical laws, recognise their conse- 
quences to be natural and inevitable ; but they do not 
sufficiently reflect upon the intentional pre-ordainrnent of 
those consequences as a warning or instruction to intelligent 
beings for the regulation of their conduct. It is the omission 
of this element that makes of so little use the knowledge of 
the natural laws which is actually possessed. The popular 
interpretations of Christianity have thrown the people so 
widely out of the track of God's natural providence, that 
His object or purpose in this pre-orclainment is rarely thought 
of ; and the most flagrant and most deliberate infractions 
of the natural laws are spoken of as mere acts of impru- 
dence, without any thought of the fact that the infringer 
is contemning a rule framed for his guidance by Divine 
wisdom, and enforced by Divine power. 

In considering moral actions also, most people leave out 
of view the natural and the inevitable. Being accustomed 



72 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAF. V. 



to regard human punishment as arbitrary, and as capable 
of abeyance or alteration, they view in the same light the 
inflictions asserted to take place under the natural moral 
law, and they fail to perceive Divine pre-ordainment and 
purpose in the natural consequences of all moral actions. 
The great object which I have had in view in my work on 
" The Constitution of Man " is to show that this notion is 
erroneous, and that a pre-ordained natural consequence, 
which man can neither alter nor evade, is attached to the 
infringement of every natural law. 

If, then, we could widely diffuse a just appreciation of 
these principles, would it, or would it not, be possible for an 
intelligent person to acquire from his parents, from his 
teachers, from the pulpit, from his medical advisers, from 
books, and from his own observation and experience, a 
knowledge of the conditions of life and health in relation to 
himself j sufficient for his guidance in the ordinary circum- 
stances of life ? And if thus instructed in these rules, if 
trained from his childhood to venerate and observe them 
as Divine institutions, and if supported in doing so by 
social manners and public opinion, could he not then, in an 
adequate degree, comply with the conditions of health, and 
escape from the supposed fatal list ? I see no reason for 
answering in the negative. If, in the first hundred years 
after the members of any community began to act on these 
principles, one individual in the thousand would escape 
from the list, and would proportionally reduce the mortality, 
the principle would be established ; and the question in 
subsequent centuries would be only how far this knowledge 
and obedience could be carried. 

In point of fact, the records of mortality prove that the 
view now stated correctly represents the principle on which 
the continuance of life is granted by the Divine Euler of 
the world. When read in connection with history, these 
records show that if the intelligence, morality, industry, 



CHAP. Y.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



73 



cleanliness, and orderly habits of a community be improved, 
there will be an increase in the duration of life in that 
people. 

Thus, in 1786, the yearly rate of mortality for the whole 
of England and Wales was 1 in 42 ; or, in other words, 1 out 
of every 42 of the whole inhabitants died annually. In the 
Seventh Annual Eeport of the Registrar-General (p. 19), it 
is stated that the rate of mortality for the whole of England, 
on an average of seven years ending in 1844, was 1 in 46. In 
the Registrar-General's Report for 1854 (p. 16), it is stated 
that in round numbers 24 in 1,000, or 1 in 43, of the people 
died in that year. This is greatly in excess of the average 
rate, which in the last seventeen years was 2 "245 per cent. : 
that is, nearly 22 in 1,000, or 1 in 45, of the population. 
The excess in the mortality was produced by an epidemic 
of cholera." This I shall show subsequently was an avoid- 
able evil. Allowing for some errors in the earlier reports 
and tables, the substantial fact remains incontestable that 
the average duration of human life is increasing in England 
and Wales, and from the causes here assigned.* 

* The more recent reports of the Registrar- General do not show 
that the average duration of human life is increasing in England and 
Wales ; "but the causes which produce this result give additional force 
to the doctrines of the text. The average mortality varies from 16 
or 17 in every 1,000 living in rural and healthy districts to 30 or 
33 in every 1,000 living in crowded and unhealthy localities. Of late, 
the tendency of the population has been to increase in cities in a much 
higher ratio than in rural districts ; consequently, a higher proportion 
of the people is now exposed to influences which act injuriously on 
their health, and the general mortality is thus increased. It has 
further to be taken into account that, in proportion to the population, 
the number of children born is considerably greater in towns than in 
the country ; and as children are much more liable than adults to 
suffer from impure air, improper diet, deficient exercise, and other 
noxious agencies, they die in greater numbers, and in this way the 
average duration of life of the whole population is lowered. — Ed. 



74 



SCIEXCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



Moreover, Professor Simpson,* in a pamphlet on the 
value and necessity of the statistical method of inquiry as 
applied to various questions in operative surgery, presents 
direct evidence in support of the proposition which I am 
maintaining. 

The following table, he says, calculated from the bills of 
mortality of London, demonstrates statistically that, in 
consequence of improvements in the practice of midwifery 
(and I should say also, in consequence of the improved 
habits and condition of the people), the number of deaths 
in childbed in that city in the nineteenth century was less 
by one-half than that which occurred in the seventeenth 
century. The table is the following : — 

Average number of AfotJiers dying hi Childbed in London 
from 1660 to 1820. 

TEARS. PROPORTION OF MOTHERS. 



For 20 years ending in , 


...16S0... 


1 in 


eTe: 


ry 44 deliverei 


For 20 years ending in .. 


...1700... 


1 


ii 


53 


fj 


For 20 Years ending in 


...1723... 




ii 


6d 


a 


For 20 years ending in 


...1740... 


1 


ii 


71 


» 


For 20 vears ending in 


...1760... 


1 


35 


t 7 


a 


For 20 years ending in , 


17S0... 


..1 


)> 


82 




For 20 Tears ending in , , 


...1800... 




3) 


110 


» 


For 20 Tears ending in , 


...1S20... 


1 


li 


107 





It is probable that, in the earlier years included in this 
table, the records were more imperfect than they were in the 
later years ; but. every reasonable allowance being made for 
errors and omissions, the grand result is still the same : a 
diminution of deaths from a more rigid conformity to the 
conditions according to which the Ruler of the world 
dispenses the boon of life. 

* Sir James Young Simpson, Bart., the inTentor of chloroform 
(1S11-1370), Professor of Midwifery in the University of Edinburgh. 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



75 



Further, the records of mortality, when arranged accord- 
ing to the different classes of society and the different 
localities of the same country, indicate the soundness of the 
same principle. The following results are presented by a 
report of the mortality in Edinburgh and Leith for the 
year 1846 

The mean age at death of the 1st class, composed of 

gentry and professional men, was . . . 43^- years. 

The mean age at death of the 2nd class, composed of 

merchants, master-tradesmen, clerks, etc., was . 35 \ years. 

The mean age at death of the 3rd class, composed of 

artisans, labourers, servants, etc., was . . .271 years. 

It is a reasonable inference from,- although not necessarily 
implied in, this table, that the third class furnished a 
larger proportion of the ten deaths in the thousand persons 
between the ages of twenty and thirty than the second, and 
this class a larger proportion of them than the first : and, 
as God is no respecter of artificial rank, that the differences 
in the proportions were the result of the individuals of the 
first and second classes having fulfilled more perfectly than 
those in the third the conditions on which He proffers to 
continue to them His boon of life. 

One of the conditions of health is, that we shall breathe 
the atmosphere in that state in which God has prepared it, 
and has adapted it to the lungs and the blood. A combina- 
tion of oxygen, nitrogen, and carbonic acid gas, in definite 
proportions, exists in the air, and is exquisitely adapted to 
our frame. A great increase or a great diminution of the pro- 
portion of any one of these, or the introduction of certain 
other gases, is fatal to health, and eventually to life itself. 

Regardless, however, of this Divine arrangement, the 
inhabitants of Exeter, Liverpool, and many other towns, 
have, through ignorance and indolence, allowed the exhala- 
tions of decaying animal and vegetable matter to mingle 



76 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. v. 

with that compound atmosphere adapted by Nature to their 
lungs and blood, and the consequence has been that many 
of them have suffered from disease, and have prematurely 
died. On the 8th of December, 1846, a public meeting was 
held at Exeter " to consider the sanitary condition of that 
city." A report was read by Mr. Terrell, which "analysed 
the mortality of Exeter, and showed that, while the deaths 
in those parts of the city where there was good sewerage 
and an ample supply of water were from 1*83 to I "93 per 
cent, (per annum), in other parts, where the drainage was 
deficient, the mortality was 5 to 7 per cent." 

Mr. Chadwick, who was present, observed that in 
infancy "life is more susceptible than at any other period 
— infants, as it were, live more on air." " Now, what is the 
mortality at Exeter compared with Tiverton ? I find that, 
while one child out of every ten born at Tiverton dies within 
the year — and one-tenth is the average of the county — one 
in five dies at Exeter. And then, after its escape of the 
first year's mortality, it has not gone through all its chances. 
I find, farther, that while in Tiverton twenty-six per cent, 
die under the age of five years, in Exeter no less than forty- 
five per cent, die under the age of five years." 

When we trace these effects to their causes, is it not 
clear that that purity of the air which, by the appointment 
of the Author of Nature, is necessary to the support of life 
had been destroyed by foul exhalations; that the human 
intellect was capable of discovering and removing the 
sources of that corruption ; and that it was a duty which 
the inhabitants of Exeter owed equally to God and to them- 
selves to apply their understandings and their wills to 
comply with the conditions of life ? Can there be a more 
becoming theme for the combined exercise of the intellect 
and the religious sentiments than that which is presented 
by such occurrences as these, in which the voice of Nature 
calls aloud on parents to save their children by yielding 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



77 



obedience to the Creator's laws? Yet what occurs in fact ? 
Mr. Chadwick informs us : "Well/ 3 says he, "here, in this 
city, in one of the healthiest comities of the kingdom, with 
an admirable site, and with all favourable circumstances, 
you have an infantile mortality and slaughter that very 
nearly follows— very closely indeed— upon the infantile 
slaughter of Spitalfields, etc. 55 

The same gentleman mentioned that, " about three years 
ago an epidemic raged in Glasgow, and there was scarcely 
a family, high or low, that escaped attacks from it. But at 
Glasgow they have an exceedingly well-appointed, well- 
ventilated prison, and in that prison there was not a single 
case of the epidemic ; and, in consequence of the overcrowd- 
ing of the hospitals, which killed some two thousand people, 
they took forty cases into the prison, and not one of them 
spread. In fact, there are so many classes of disease so 
completely within management, that medical men who have 
the care and custody of those who are in comparatively 
well-conditioned places, are in the habit of saying, in relation 
to cases in their private practice, ' Oh, if I had but that case 
in prison, I could save it.' Xow. what has your mortality 
to do with that disease here in Exeter 2 I find that in 
Tiverton, while 23 out of 10,000 of the population are swept 
off by epidemic diseases, in Exeter no less than 103 are killed. 55 

Here, then, we see a man of science, whose understand- 
ing is enlightened by the study of chemistry and physiology, 
clearly unfolding to the people of Exeter certain relations 
established by the Author of Nature between the composi- 
tion of the atmosphere and the human body, in consequence 
of the disregard of which thousands of their fellow-citizens 
have perished prematurely. Yet these infractions of the laws 
of Nature were allowed to continue, year after year, under the 
eyes of the Bishop of Exeter, unheeded and unrestrained. 

Not only so ; but while his flock was thus dying from 
causes that were discoverable and removable, his Lordship 



78 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



was engaged in warmly denouncing as irreligious the Irish 
system of National Education, because it proposed to teach, 
under the name of secular instruction, unmingled with the 
leaven of the Thirty-nine Articles of the Church, a know- 
ledge of these very institutions of the Creator, a due regard 
to which would have enabled the people to save their own 
lives and those of their children ! 

I do not doubt that he and his clergy duly consoled the 
dying, read the burial-service over the bodies of the dead, 
and comforted the bereaved parents whose cherished off- 
spring were thus prematurely snatched from them. But if 
these mournful effects followed by God's appointment from 
causes which were cognisable by human intelligence and 
removable by human skill, why did they shrink from 
teaching the people to reverence this connection, and to 
avoid the evils, by acting on the lessons which it was read- 
ing to their understandings? This would have tended in 
some degree to restore the sacredness of this universe, and 
that earnestness of the human mind, the disappearance of 
which religious men so grievously deplore. 

So far from acting in this manner, these excellent and 
estimable persons not only treat the order of creation and 
its lessons with neglect themselves, but by their cries 
of "infidelity' 5 they deter other men, who see and reverence 
its sacredness, from appealing to the nobler faculties of the 
mind with full practical effect in its behalf. "What a soul- 
stirring theme did not the facts now detailed offer to Mr. 
Chadwick and his brother philanthropists for an appeal to 
the sentiment of Veneration of the people of Exeter, to 
induce them to bring these evils to a close ! But no : 
science, divorced from religion, dared not to trespass on 
such a field. Unfortunately, also, in the minds of the 
suffering members of the bishop's flock there was no 
adequate knowledge of science on which to found an appeal 
to their religious sentiments. The speakers, therefore, 



CHAP. V.] 



LIFE AND DEATH. 



70 



could urge only the humbler motives of economy and 
prudence. " While," Mr. Chadwick said, " amidst this 
population of the Tiverton district (32,499), in Tiverton 
610 die, no less than 920 die in Exeter. That makes an 
excess of deaths due to Exeter of 332 deaths in the year. 
The expense of a funeral is certainly not less than £5 on 
the average. Taking it at £5 your expenses, in funerals, 
for the excess of funerals compared with Tiverton during 

the year, are £1,600 

Every case of death involves at least 29 cases 
of sickness, which, at £7 per case, is an 
annual expense of . . . . 9,205 

Besides that, you have a loss of labour of 
four years and eleven months by pre- 
mature death, as compared with Tiverton, 
which, on the excess of this year's mor- 
tality, makes a sum, supposing wages to 
be 7s. 6d. weekly per adult, on the average 
(and a very low average), of . . . 39,000 

Making a total charge to this city of at least £49.865 
Say £50,000 a year. And that does not take into account 
anything for the loss of the maintenance of the children 
that have been swept away, nothing for the extensive 
amount of premature widowhood, for the large amount of 
orphanage, you will find burdening your charities." 

This is a truly English argument, employed to induce a 
people suffering from gross neglect of the order of Nature 
to remove the causes of pestilence and death from their 
dwellings ! I greatly err in my estimate of the mental 
faculties of Mr. Chadwick if he is not as deeply impressed 
with the "sacreclness of this universe, and of this human 
life itself,'' as he is obviously alive to the emotions of 
benevolence ; and if he would not have felt his power over 
Jais audience greatly increased, had he found their under- 



so 



SCIENCE AND 'RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



standings so far enlightened that he could have ventured to 
appeal to their religious sentiments in order to give weight 
and authority to his words. Not only, however, was the 
knowledge of Nature wanting in them, but an appeal to it, 
in connection with the religious sentiments, might have 
been regarded by religious men as infidelity, while by some 
men of science it would probably have been ridiculed as 
" cant and creed." Such is the predicament into which the 
teaching of the order of Nature as a guide to human 
conduct under the sanction of the religious sentiments has 
been brought by English education ! No safe course was 
left to Mr. Chadwick but the one which he pursued : that 
of addressing the lower faculties of the people — their ac- 
quisitiveness and their fear ! 

I do not question the force of the arguments addressed 
to these faculties ; because Nature is so arranged that when 
we depart from her paths in one direction, we are liable to 
fall into a multitude of errors, each accompanied by its own 
peculiar evils. Pecuniary loss is one of the natural con- 
sequences of bad health ; but the consideration of that 
infliction is not one of the highest or most efficacious motives 
with which to rouse a well-educated people to remove from 
their hearths the causes of disease and death.* 

* Instructive evidence of the possibility of diminishing the amount 
of premature deaths by compliance with the laws of health is pre- 
sented in a letter of the President of the General Board of Health to 
the Home Secretary of State, and in a Report annexed to it, from 
Dr. Sutherland on Epidemic Cholera in the Metropolis in 1854. He 
mentions that " in the newly-constructed model dwellings and lodging- 
houses, all the evils and neglects existing in the same class of dwell- 
ings in other parts of the metropolis are as far as possible avoided. 
There are neither cesspools, ash-pits, nor nuisances ; all the houses 
have water-closets ; and there is an abundant water supply, and 
suitable means of ventilation are provided." Statistics are given 
which show that sickness and death were greatly less frequent than 
in inferior classes of dwellings. 



CHAP, v.] LIFE AND DEATH. 81 

Dr. South wood Smith, in his instructive work on "The 
Philosophy of Health," shows the connection between lon- 
gevity and happiness. " By a certain amount and intensity 
of misery," says he, "life may be suddenly destroyed ; by a 
smaller amount and intensity it may be slowly worn out and 
exhausted. The state of the mind affects the physical con- 
dition ; but the continuance of life is wholly dependent on 
the physical condition : it follows that in the degree in which 
the state of the mind is capable of affecting the physical 
condition, it is capable of influencing the duration of life. 

"Were the physical condition always perfect, and the 
mental state always that of enjoyment, the duration of life 
would always be extended to the utmost limit compatible 
with that of the organisation of the body. But as this 
fortunate concurrence seldom or never happens, human life 
seldom or never numbers the full measure of its days. 
Uniform experience shows, however, that, provided no 
accident occur to interrupt the usual course, in proportion 
as body and mind approximate to this state, life is long ; 
and as they recede from it, it is short. Improvement of the 
physical condition affords a foundation for the improve- 
ment of. the mental state ; improvement of the mental 
state improves, up to a certain point, the physical condition"; 
and in the ratio in which this twofold improvement is 
affected, the duration of life increases. 

"Longevity, then, is a good, in the first place, because it 
is a sign and a consequence of the possession of a certain 
amount of enjoyment ; and, in the second place, because 
this being the case, of course in proportion as the term 
of life is extended the sum of enjoyment must be aug- 
mented. And this view of longevity assigns the cause, and 
shows the reasonableness of that desire for long life which 
is so universal and constant as to be commonly considered 
instinctive. Longevity and happiness, if not invariably, 
are generally, coincident. 

G 



82 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. v. 



"If there may be happiness without longevity, the con- 
verse is not possible : there cannot be longevity without 
happiness. Unless the state of the body be that of tolerable 
health, and the state of the mind that of tolerable enjoy- 
ment, long life is unattainable : these physical and mental 
conditions no longer existing, nor capable of existing, 
the desire of life and the power of retaining it cease 
together." 

The same conclusion follows from these facts — that life 
is administered according to regular laws, which some 
persons obey to a greater extent than others ; and that 
knowledge of the causes which favour the endurance of 
life, and of those Avhich produce disease and death, is 
a knowledge of the order of God's providence in this grand 
department of the government of the world. Can we doubt, 
then, that the relations of cause and effect, in virtue of 
which life is preserved and death ensues, have been 
rendered by God cognisable by the human understanding, 
with the design of serving as guides to human conduct J 



83 



CHAPTER VI. 

Moral Government of Nations. 

In the Bible we are told " to do justly, to love mercy, and 
to walk humbly with our God ;; : that is, to obey His com- 
mandments. We are desired also to love our neighbours as 
ourselves, and to do unto them as we should wish that they 
should do unto us. Are these precepts practical in this 
world, or are they not % and what is implied in their being 
practical ? Before they can become practical, it must be 
shown that they are in harmony with, and supported by, the 
order of Nature : that is to say, that Nature is so consti- 
tuted and arranged, that all the real interests of individuals 
and nations are compatible with one another, and that it is 
not necessary to rob and impoverish one, whether individual 
or nation, in order to enrich another ; not only so, but that 
all injustice, oppression, and spoliation, being in opposition 
to the order of Nature, must ultimately lead to evil and 
suffering to the perpetrator, or to those to whom he leaves 
the legacy of his spoils and his crimes. 

If such is the constitution of Nature, then these precepts 
are practical. If, on the other hand, the order of Provi- 
dence admits of individuals and nations profiting by in- 
justice and oppression, and reaching and continuing to 
enjoy real prosperity and happiness through the systematic 
practice of crimes and violence, then are these precepts not 
practical in this world. 

The history of all Christian nations shows that while 
they professed to believe in the Divine authority of the 
Scriptures, they were in a great measure sceptics as to the 
G 2 



84 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. 



[ghap. vl 



Scriptural precepts being supported and enforced by the 
order of Nature. In their conduct towards each other , they 
have too often set them at defiance ; nay. each has striven 
to depress, spoil, and ruin its neighbour, as the most 
effectual means of raising itself to independence and 
prosperity. But not one of the nations has succeeded in 
attaining its ends by these means. The history of the 
treatment of Ireland by England affords an instructive 
lesson on this topic. 

Six centuries ago. in the reign of Henry II. England 
conquered the sister isle, and ever since has continued to sway 
her destinies. From the first day of her conquest to very 
recent times, English statesmen have acted towards Ireland 
on principles diametrically opposed to the injunctions of 
the New Testament. They insulted the feelings of the 
Irish, placed shackles on their industry, excluded them 
from many of the most valuable rights of British subjects, 
placed the religion of the majority out of the pale of the 
constitution, prohibited its professors, under pain of banish- 
ment for the first offence, and of death for the second, to 
act as schoolmasters or tutors in the instruction of their own 
people ; and when at last Ireland, in a moment of her 
strength and of England's weakness, asserted her indepen- 
dence, and achieved a native legislature, English statesmen, 
in 1783, converted that legislature, by means of systematic 
corruption, into a new instrument of injustice and op- 
pression. 

England pursued this course notoriously with the view 
of providing for her own safety, prosperity, and power. 
Has she succeeded ? Xo. A calm survey of her history 
will show that from the first day of her oppression to the 
present time, every injury inflicted on Ireland has recoiled 
on her own head; and that Ireland continued to be the 
source of her greatest weakness, anxiety, and suffering, 
until she amended her line of conduct. She has paid eight 



chap, vi.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 85 



millions sterling to save from starvation the victims of 
the system which she had [pursued, but she does not yet 
see the end of the retribution which she has drawn upon 
her head. 

During this long crusade against the course of Provi- 
dence and the precepts of Christianity, the rulers and 
people of England professed to believe in the Divine 
authority of the Scriptural injunctions which they were 
trampling under foot. They had the Bible in their hands ; 
they had catechisms, a liturgy, clergymen, and bishops — in 
short, all the means of learning their duty to Gcd and to 
their fellow-men ; but all did not suffice to lead them into 
the practice of benevolence and justice. What did they 
lack 1 They did not believe in the reality of a Divine 
government on earth ; and if they ever imagined such a 
thing, they did not perceive that it was moral. Their 
religious emotions were entwined with dogmas which 
represented this world as a wreck of a better system, 
and the heart of man as " deceitful above all things, and 
desperately wicked/' 5 They believed in a day of judg- 
ment and in future reward and punishment ; but this 
belief did not affect their conduct so as to lead them to 
practise what they professed to believe. If they had be- 
lieved in an actual moral government of the world, their 
conduct would have been as insane as that of men who 
should sow corn in snow, and expect to reap a harvest from 
it in winter. 

Cromwell and the religious men of his age did not re- 
cognise the order of Xature as supporting Christianity. On 
the contrary, they not only believed in a special super- 
natural providence, but when they were gratifying their 
own misguided passions, they complacently viewed them- 
selves as the chosen instruments of Gods vengeance for 
punishing His enemies. Statesmen who were not religious 
either formed no deliberate opinion of any kind regarding 



8G 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION, 



[chap. VI. 



the course of Providence on earth, or considered it as arbi- 
trary or mysterious, not cognisable by man, and not avail- 
able as a guide to human conduct. Indeed, the great 
majority of Christian statesmen and people, while they are 
disposed to acknowledge the existence of physical laws of 
Nature, still show a practical disbelief in the government of 
the world by moral laws. 

Another example of unbelief in the action of a moral 
providence in Nature is afforded by the author of an able 
and eloquent pamphlet : " The Case of Ireland Stated," by 
Robert Holmes, Esq. After detailing the wrongs of Ire- 
land, he thus speaks of the proposal to employ "a moral 
force" as a means of her deliverance : "Moral force is a 
power, by the mere operation of reason, to convince the 
understanding and satisfy the consciences of those on whom 
the effect is to be wrought ; that there is some particular 
moral act, within their ability to perform, which ought to 
be performed, and which it is their duty to perform ; and 
also, by the operation of the same Divine principle only, 
making those free moral agents do the very thing required. 
The intended effect must be produced, and must be moral 
— the efficient cause must be moral, purely moral, unmixed, 
unadulterated by any mean or sordid views ; reason, heavenly 
reason, applied with eloquence divine ; no threat, no intimi- 
dation, no cold iron, no ' vile guns,' no ' villainous saltpetre 
digged out of the bowels of the harmless earth ' : nothing but 
the radiant illuminations of moral truth." 

Mr. Holmes regards this as a mere " evaporation plan/' 
adopted as a safety-valve to Irish discontent. " It seems," 
says he, "to be considered by the expediency men of the 
day as a first-rate contrivance " ; but he regards it as pure 
"fudge," and seems to prefer "monster meetings" and dis- 
plays of physical force, which may be used in case of need, 
as better calculated to accomplish "repeal of the Union," 
and the redress of Ireland's wrongs. 



chap. VI.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 87 



But Ireland Lad frequently tried to right herself by 
means of '''cold iron," "vile guns," and ''villainous salt- 
petre/'" and with what success her present condition shows.* 
It is obvious that Mr. Holmes does not comprehend the 
lessons contained in his own pamphlet, and is an unbe- 
liever in the moral government of the world. He does not 
see that the advocates of justice tc Ireland are backed net 
only by the "moral" but by the "physical'"' force of God's 
providence, in virtue of which they are able to demonstrate 
to England that every sordid act which she has committed 
against Ireland has rebounded in evil to herself, and that 
the Divine government is so thoroughly moral, so skilfully 
combined, and so unbendingly enforced, that the wisdom of 
all her statesmen, and the counsels of all her bishops, have 
not sufficed to turn aside the stream of suffering which she 
has drawn, and will continue to draw, upon herself, from 
every fountain of injustice which she has opened, or may 
hereafter open, in Ireland. What are the disappointments 
to avarice, the humiliations of baffled bigotry, the incessant 
consciousness of insecurity and weakness, and the lavish 
waste of treasure, which England so long experienced from 

* I am no advocate of the doctrine of non-resistance. Faculties 
cf Conibativeness and Destruetiveness exist in man. and they have 
legitimate spheres of activity, one of which appears to "be to repel by 
physical force aggression which we cannot overcome by moral means. 
Armed resistance is one of the natural checks to injustice : but it is 
attended by a great disadvantage. The contests of force are governed 
bv the laws of force. The most numerous, best appointed, best dis- 
ciplined, and most ably commanded army, vsill gain the victory, irre- 
spective of the moral merits of the cause for which it rights. High 
moral motives animating it will, no doubt, add to its discipline, its 
patience, and its devotion, and thus mdirectly contribute to success ; 
but they will not, in any other respect, supply the place of the ordi- 
nary sinews of war. Xature, however, has other modes of arresting 
injustice : and violence should never be resorted to until all better 
means have been tried without success. 



88 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. VI. 



lier injustice to Ireland, but the sanctions of Nature's moral 
laws, and the punishments which give reality and efficacy to 
the doctrine of " moral force " ] 

One gigantic wrong to Ireland remains unredressed — the 
seizure of the property of her Eoman Catholic Church, and 
the application of it to maintain a Protestant ecclesiastical 
establishment disowned by the great majority of the people. 
If not relinquished, this enormity will lead to the downfall 
of the Church of England itself. The transfer is grossly 
immoral, because the Church of England's creed is sacred 
only to the individuals whose religious emotions have been 
trained to reverence it, and the faith of the Eoman Catholic 
is equally sacred in his estimation. (See page 25.) The 
conveyance of the property from the one Church to the 
other, therefore, was an act of pure oppression, perpetrated 
by the strong against the weak : and when the moral and 
religious emotions of the British people are emancipated 
from their present errors, they will discover the magnitude 
of this injustice, and ask if the faith of that Church can he 
pure which permitted its votaries to commit, and for so 
many centuries to maintain, such a spoliation, accompanied 
by all the demoralising influences on both Catholics and 
Protestants which have flowed from its polluted fountains. 
When this question shall be answered; a new Eeformation 
will not be far distant.* 

Mr. Cobden and his coadjutors carried repeal of the 
corn-laws by the use of moral force alone ; but they under- 
stood its nature and sanctions : that is to say, they demon- 
strated to the religious public that free trade is implied in 
the Scripture precepts before quoted — to the moral public, 
that free trade is prescribed by the dictates of the sentiment 
of justice inherent in the human mind — to the merchant, 

* The Episcopal Church in Ireland was disestablished and dis- 
endowed in 1869.— Ed. 



chap, vi.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 83 

the manufacturer, and the husbandman, not only that free 
trade is compatible with, and calculated to promote, their 
worldly interests, but that these cannot be permanently 
and systematically advanced by any other means. In short, 
they showed that every attempt of every class to benefit 
itself by unjust monopolies and restrictions had not merely 
failed, but had actually obstructed the attainment, through 
other and moral means, of the very objects which the 
monopolies were introduced to promote. 

Unless all this be actually true, free trade cannot 
maintain itself even now when it is established ; and it 
was the moral conviction that these views are true that 
first inspired Mr. Cobden with full confidence in the success 
of his agitation. Already we have evidence in the results 
that the principles of free trade are supported by the order 
of Nature. 

The advocates of "moral force/' therefore, who see a 
moral government of the world established and enforced 
by God, wield not only "reason, heavenly reason,'' as an 
instrument for attaining justice, but "threats" and "in- 
timidation" — not the threats of "cold iron" and "vile 
guns," which may be employed in support of oppression 
and wrong as successfully as in vindication of right, but 
" threats " of evil from a Power which no human sagacity 
can baffle, and no might can withstand. Yet, if the threats 
be real, and if the inflictions be as certain as fate, what a 
strange condition of mind must Christian men be in when 
they imagine moral force to be a mere " evaporation plan,'' 
altogether unsupported when not backed by " vile guns and 
villainous saltpetre ! " 

Before, however, they can wield moral force with effect, 
they must be converted to a belief in the real, actual, and 
efficient government of the world by God's secular provi- 
dence ; they must understand the scheme, and search for 
the evidence of this government, and teach it to their 



90 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap, vt 



countrymen. The creeds and confessions of Churches must 
be revised and new-modelled into accordance with the 
order of Nature, and the Christian precepts must be 
allowed the benefit of Nature's support to give efficacy to 
their injunctions. 

If the liberal members of the European community who 
desire to accomplish moral, religious, and political reforms, 
could be convinced of the reality of the moral government 
of the world, and could be induced to take up this doctrine 
as the basis of their operations, no political tyranny and 
no erroneous creed could withstand their assaults. While 
they rely on guns and bayonets as their means of resisting 
misrule, they stand at a disadvantage, for these are as 
available to defend error as to maintain truth ; but when, 
abjuring these, they shall employ their higher faculties in 
discovering and demonstrating the combination of causes 
and effects by means of which that moral government is 
carried into operation, they will become conscious of a 
strength before which error in every form will ultimately 
succumb. 

Mr. Holmes's blindness to the moral order of creation 
is evinced by another proposal which he advocates. While 
he admits that, during ail the period of England's op- 
pression, Irishmen were in general so destitute of moral 
principle, patriotism, and mutual confidence, that England 
at all times found among them willing tools to perpetrate 
her deeds of injustice, and Ireland never (except for a few 
months in 1782) found in her own population moral, intel- 
lectual, and physical resources sufficient to oppose or arrest 
them — he looks to repeal of the Union, and the delivery 
of Irish affairs into Irish hands, as the only panacea for 
her sufferings and her wrongs. 

But if the view which I am now expounding is not a 
dream, the wrongs of Ireland will never be righted until her 
destinies are swayed by a moral and enlightened legislature ) 



chap, vi.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 91 



and whether this shall hold its sittings on the one 
side of St. George's Channel or on the other, will matter 
little to either country; for, as God's providence embraces 
both, and has rendered beneficence and justico the only- 
road to permanent happiness and prosperity for either, that 
legislature will first redress her wrongs which shall first 
bow before the power of God, and enforce His laws as 
superior in wisdom and efficacy to any which their own 
selfishness and prejudices can substitute in their place.* 

The conquest of India by the British nation is another 
striking example of disregard of the action of a moral 
providence in regulating human affairs. In " The Con- 
stitution of Man" I pointed out the inconsistency of our 
dominion in India with the natural laws which govern the 
moral world, and predicted disaster as the inevitable result. 
In 1857 a mutiny of the native army, raised and disciplined 
by the East India Company, broke out, and spread misery 
and desolation over the fairest provinces of that empire. 
On hearing of its occurrence, the British people, with pain- 
ful unanimity/called aloud for the re-conquest of the country 
and the condign punishment of the mutineers. The Bishop 
of London actually composed a prayer to God for our 
success in this enterprise. Men who venerate the memory 
of Sir William Wallace, beheaded on Tower Hill as a rebel 
for resisting in arms the English invaders of his native 
land, and who celebrate King Bobert Bruce as a hero for 
his expulsion of the English conquerors of his kingdom, 
called loudly for the punishment of the natives of India 
who were pursuing a similar course of action. 

The atrocities committed by the mutinous soldiery 

* These observations were written and first published in 1847- 
England has since partially changed her course of action towards 
Ireland, and already blessed fruits are visible in Ireland's peace and 
prosperity, and in England's tranquillity. 



92 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. vt. 

sicken the heart of humanity ; but the British are in 
India as conquerors and spoilers, and it is a gross self- 
delusion to believe that their leading motive is to civilise 
and improve the Indian people. They go there to amass 
wealth and earn pensions out of native industry, with 
which to return home and enjoy a comfortable old age. 
They cannot take root in India, and are never at home in 
it. Although, therefore, we may deplore the sufferings of 
men who are personally innocent of evil intentions, never- 
theless we are forced to regard their sufferings as examples 
of the retribution which, sooner or later, invariably over- 
takes those who set at defiance the laws by which God 
governs the moral world. The guilt of the sufferers consists 
in their lending themselves, from selfish motives, to main- 
tain a vicious system. 

It is lamentable, also, to observe that those who regard 
Christianity as the fountain of mercy and justice are utterly 
blind to the inconsistency of national spoliation and con- 
quest with its precepts ; or, if they perceive the discrepancy, 
are altogether unbelievers in the doctrine that Christian 
morality is practically enforced in the world by God. In 
the Scotsman of 15th August, 1857, there are two letters, 
dated in April of that year, from Lieutenant-Colonel 
Wheler, commanding the 34th Regiment of Native Infantry, 
in which he acknowledges that he preached the way of 
salvation through Jesus Christ to all persons who would 
hear him, including his soldiers, and declares that in doing 
so he was obeying his heavenly Superior. He was cen- 
sured for using the privilege his rank gave him to 
proselytise the soldiers. He replied, that he renders unto 
Coesar the things that are Caesar's, and obeys his earthly 
superiors in all things temporal ; but, " when speaking to 
the natives upon the subject of religion," he says, "I am 
acting in the capacity of a Christian soldier under the 
authority of my heavenly Superior. In carrying out these 



chap, vi.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 93 



duties towards my heavenly Superior, I am reminded by 
the Saviour that I must count the cost, and expect per- 
secution, &c, but I am promised grace and strength in 
every time of trouble and difficulty, and a rich reward 
hereafter." His regiment was the first to mutiny, under 
the apprehension that they were to be forced to become 
Christians ; but this man was in the right if his religion 
is true, and those who condemn his conduct, and profess 
belief in the principles on which he boldly and honestly 
acted, are themselves deserving of condemnation for in- 
consistency and for acting on shams. 

In the Times of 17th August, 1857, there is a very 
interesting letter, dated in 1850, from Sir Charles Napier 
describing the British misrule in India in both civil and 
military departments, and the cruel oppression and insult- 
ing injustice of their sway. So far, however, are these prin- 
ciples from being recognised as true, that in 1857 and 1853 
our public press, with few exceptions, breathed the most 
fiery indignation against the native mutineers in India who 
rebelled against our yoke. It recorded slaughters and exe- 
cutions of them which made the blood run cold, as just 
retributions of their massacres of the British residents of 
both sexes and all ages. The press was blind to the fact 
that w r e were in India as conquerors, and that the right to 
national independence is indestructible. The religious 
press, clerical platforms, and pulpits, with equally few 
exceptions, justified our conduct, and invoked the blessing 
of God on our arms. 

A friend who knew the House of Commons well, and 
who entertained views of our Indian rule similar to those 
now expressed, observed to me that if any member had 
risen and expounded the principles of a Divine moral 
government of the w r orld, and applied them to India, he 
would have emptied the House, and destroyed his own 
reputation and influence for ten years to come. Such has 



94 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. vi. 



been the result of the philosophy and religion of our age 
combined ! 

Our whole course with regard to India has been a mis- 
take. Self-esteem and love of approbation exist in the 
natives, and give them the love of independence. The 
dominion of a foreign people over them in their own land is 
repugnant to this feeling. The repugnance is natural, and 
we cannot extirpate it. When it is said that we rule so 
mildly and justly, that we shall educate, enlighten, and 
Christianise the natives, and thus attach them to our sway 
— there is a/eZo de se in the argument, becausedhe more any 
people are civilised and enlightened, the more odious and 
intolerable does a foreign yoke become to them. 

We are told that the natives, and particularly the Sepoys, 
swore allegiance to the British Government, and then 
treacherously rebelled. But William Tell and his band of 
Swiss patriots also swore oaths of loyalty to their Austrian 
lords, yet conspired and prepared in secret for their great 
effort of liberation. Do we blame them for this, or stigma- 
tise them as perjured rebels? When the Peruvians formed, 
a conspiracy to liberate themselves from the Spanish yoke 
which lasted for thirty years, and of which they all the time 
kept the secret inviolate, do we entertain any feeling except 
one of regret that their patriotic exertions were unsuccess- 
ful 1 Why, then., should we in history condemn conquests of 
which we attempt to justify the parallels when perpetrated 
by ourselves 1 And why should we in history applaud re- 
sistance to conquerors, and yet, when it is employed against 
ourselves, stigmatise and punish it as rebellion I 

The civilisation of the natives of India is naturally 
incompatible with the permanence of our dominion. If wo 
intend to rule them as a conquered people, we must keep 
them ignorant and distracted, and divided into castes, 
in order to render them incapable of combining in a 
well- concerted effort to expel us ; for, whenever they are- 



CHAP. VI.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 95 



enlightened, their desire to sweep us from their shores will 
grow with their consciousness of power. If, on the other 
hand, we should sincerely aim at raising them to a point of 
civilisation at which they could unite as one State, or divide 
into several free and independent communities, w T ith the 
purpose of then amicably leaving them — what a gigantic 
task do we undertake ! The very notion is Utopian in the 
highest degree ; and at what a cost of life and labour would 
the attempt be made ! 

But the idea is chimerical. The climate, the distance, 
the antipathy of race, the disproportion between the 
Europeans and the natives, and above all, the sword in our 
hand, render success impossible. In my judgment, then, the 
argument of benefit to the natives is sheer pretence. It is 
like the boast of the Spaniards that they conquered South 
America to Christianise and save the souls of the natives ; 
like the defence of the English slave trade, that our object 
was to reclaim the Africans from heathenism ; like the apo- 
logy of the American slaveholders, that they are rendering 
their slaves happier than they could be in freedom. 

There is partial truth in all these pretences when only 
one side of human nature is considered ; but those who 
contemplate the whole faculties of man will understand 
why history shows that the rule of a native tyrant is pre- 
ferred to that of foreign conquerors : why even war and its 
devastations among themselves in defence of independence 
is preferred by half-civilised races to a long reign of tran- 
quillity founded on the extinction of national life. The 
wars of Europe are examples in point, and human nature is 
composed of the same elements in India and in Europe. 

Another striking example of a people professing Christi- 
anity being utter unbelievers in the Divine moral govern- 
ment of the world is afforded by the legal enactment of 
slavery as a " domestic institution " in the Southern States 
of the American Union. Every principle of natural 



96 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. VI. 



humanity and justice condemns the gross selfishness of 
converting men into " chattels," compelling them to labour 
for the profit of others, and buying and selling them, 
irrespectively of all ties of kindred, place, and custom ; and 
if there be a moral Providence at all ruling in the world, 
this " institution," being founded in iniquity, and being a 
flagrant and presumptuous defiance of the Divine laws, 
must lead sooner or later to terrible disaster to all who 
participate in it.* Nevertheless, it is a melancholy spectacle 
to see ministers of the Christian religion, after being driven 
from every position of reason and morality in attempting to 
defend it, falling back on the authority of Scripture as the 
last and strongest tower of strength by which to maintain its 
odious existence. 

The advocates of the inherent moral disorder of the 
world, however, will probably point to history, and to the 
actual condition of the human race in every country, as 
affording demonstrative evidence that this supposed moral 
government is a dream. The past and present sufferings of 
mankind cannot be disputed; but in what age or nation 
have the religious instructors of the people been believers 
in an actual moral government of the world by God ? 
Where and when have they expounded the natural arrange- 
ments by means of which this government is accomplished ? 
and when and where have they directed the religious senti- 
ments of the people to reverence and follow the natural laws 
as the roads to virtue and prosperity ? 

Ever since the promulgation of Christianity, has any 
nation discovered, and practically fulfilled, the natural con- 
ditions by which the precepts of this religion may be sup- 
ported and enforced ? Not one example is known of such 
conduct. Need we, therefore, be surprised that the results 

* The author's prediction was fulfilled, perhap3 sooner than he 
expected, in the Civil War of 1861-65.— Ed. 



chap, vi.] MORAL GOVERNMENT OF NATIONS. 



97 



are such as history discloses and as we ourselves perceive 1 
The evidence of past and present experience certainly 
demonstrates that mankind, by shutting their eyes to the 
order of Providence in the world, by trampling the dictates 
of morality and religion under foot, and by seeking pros- 
perity and happiness under the guidance of unsound 
religious dogmas and of their own selrish propensities, have 
never realised the objects of their desires; but it does not 
prove that no scheme of moral government adapted to their 
nature exists. It shows that they have not discovered such 
a scheme: but neither had they discovered the steam-engine, 
railroads, or the effects of chloroform, until very recently. 
They have been, and generally speaking continue to be, 
ignorant of their own nature, of the adaptations of the 
external world to its constitution, of the principles on which 
the order of Nature is framed, and of their own capabilities 
of conforming to it ; and thus many of their sufferings may 
be accounted for. 

The most intelligent, moral, and industrious nations are 
the most prosperous and happy ; the most ignorant, idle, 
self-seeking, turbulent, and aggressive are the most miser- 
able and poor. These undeniable facts afford strong indica- 
tions that a moral government of the world by natural laws 
exists ; and if it does so, is not the discovery of its scheme 
an important study, claiming the serious attention of man I 
I cannot too often repeat that unless the Christian morality 
be sustained and enforced by the order of Nature, it is in 
vain to teach it as a rule of conduct in secular affairs. 

And how can this study be commenced and prosecuted, 
how can new truths be turned into practical account, except 
by reverencing Nature and her adaptations as Divine insti- 
tutions, by teaching them to the young, and by enforcing 
them with the authority of the moral and religious senti- 
ments ? If man is a moral and intellectual being, it appears 
not to be inconsistent with this character that his mind 

H 



98 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. VI. 



and body Lave been constituted in harmony with external 
nature, and that he has been left, in the exercise of his 
discretion, to work out to a considerable extent his own 
weal or woe. The fact that man, through ignorance and 
the misapplication of his powers, has hitherto suffered much 
misery, affords no conclusive evidence that by more exten- 
sive knowledge, and stricter obedience to the laws of his 
nature, he may not greatly improve his condition. 



99 



CHAPTER VII. 

The World an Institution". 

Is this world, as it now exists, an Institution, or is it the 
wreck of a better system? By an Institution I mean an 
object formed apparently according to a plan, and designed 
for a purpose. By the wreck of a better system is meant a 
state of things in which order and design may be inferred to 
have once existed, but in which they no longer appear. In 
it, dislocation of parts has destroyed consistency of plan, 
and abortive results indicate defeated design. To which 
category does this world, such as it now exists, belong ? 

In attempting to answer this question, we may begin 
with the Planetary System. Apparently it is an Institu- 
tion : for, so far as has yet been discovered, its parts are 
systematically arranged, and design is discernible in its 
objects. Oar Earth is a member of this system ; and the 
place it holds there is therefore systematic and designed. 
One feature of its position is the inclination of its axis at 
an angle of 23 degrees to the plane of the ecliptic : and 
among its phenomena is its annual revolution round the sun. 
These, therefore, are portions of the plan of the solar system, 
and the effects which they produce must be regarded as 
designed. 

One of these effects is the production of Summer and 
Winter, with arctic, temperate, and torrid zones, and all 
the enjoyments and sufferings arising therefrom. Surveying 
these regions, we discover men and animals constituted 
with qualities adapted to each of them : the reindeer and 
the walrus thrive in regions of ice and snow, and could not 
H2 



100 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION, [chap. vil. 



live within the tropics ; while the camel and the dolphin 
flourish in heat, but would perish in the arctic zone. The 
Hindu and the Negro would become extinct in Lapland ; 
and the Laplander on the plains of Bengal, or in the interior 
of Africa. 

Pursuing our observations, we might at first imagine the 
vast expanse of ocean, in which none of the higher forms of 
vegetable or of animal life can exist, to be the result of some 
hideous catastrophe which had befallen our planet, and had 
defaced its original fairer features. But if we investigated 
the constitution and the relations of the ocean more closely, 
w T e should probably be led to view it in a different light. 
Experience, for example, shows that the soil requires water 
to render it fertile, and that the higher forms of animal and 
vegetable life are absolutely dependent on its fertility for 
their existence. 

Although man has discovered that w T ater can be produced 
by combining oxygen and hydrogen, no process has yet been 
observed in active operation in Nature for providing a con- 
stant supply of water by this method. Indeed, such a 
process could not be permanently continued in operation 
without sooner or later producing a deluge, unless a counter- 
acting process for resolving the water back into its elements 
were also provided ; and such processes, continued on the 
gigantic scale necessary to irrigate the whole earth, would 
have produced great fluctuations in the proportions of the 
gases which constitute our atmosphere, on the permanent 
relations of which the continuation of animal and vegetable 
life depends. 

The actual order of Nature has been to form water suffi- 
cient for supplying moisture for the land ; to collect it in huge 
basins ; and to endow the air with properties for absorb- 
ing it, for carrying it to great distances, and for depositing it 
in the form of dew and rain where it is wanted. In process 
of time, after having fertilised the ground, and helped to 



CHAP. YIT.] 



THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 



101 



nourish animal and vegetable life, it finds its way back by 
rivers into its original ocean bed, whence it is again ab- 
sorbed, again travels on the wings of the wind, again 
irrigates the plains, the valleys, and the mountains, and 
thus continues to perform an endless series of beneficent 
revolutions, without increasing or decreasing in quantity, 
and without deranging any other part or process of Nature. 

Moreover, vre find the ocean replete with animal life, and 
the forms in which it exists adapted not only to the watery 
element itself, but to its temperature in the different zones. 

Viewed in this light, then, does the ocean present itself 
to our minds as the result of a catastrophe, or as an Institu- 
tion formed on a plan, and designed for a purpose 1 To me, 
the latter appears the rational inference; yet, while these 
arrangements are the sources of innumerable enjoyments, it 
is undeniable that they are also accompanied by contingent 
evils. 

Natural History also shows that unity of plan is dis- 
cernible in the formation of the organisms of man and the 
lower animals. Goethe, in his theories on the morphology 
of plants, Oken, a German physiologist, and Geoffroy St. 
Hilaire, a celebrated French writer on the same science, are 
considered to have demonstrated this proposition. Struc- 
tures so various, so extensive, and adapted to such different 
habitats as earth, ocean, and air, all characterised by 
similarity of plan, seem to proclaim design, and not the 
wreck of a higher system. 

Geological investigations, again, have demonstrated that 
the order of Nature, instead of retrograding, has been 
advancing. Lower conditions of physical, vegetable, and 
animal existence have passed away, and have been succeeded 
by higher states ; and there is no reason to suppose that 
the limit of improvement has been attained. But in all the 
changes we perceive the organic adaptation to the inorganic 
conditions of the earth. At present, we arc incapable of 



102 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. vii. 



penetrating fully into either the plan or the design of the 
constitution of the earth and its occupants ; but wherever 
our knowledge of Nature is exact and tolerably complete, we 
are led to the conclusion that, with all its unexplained 
anomalies and apparent imperfections, it is not only an 
Institution, but an advancing Institution, rather than the 
w 7 reck of a higher order of things. The work of Paley on 
"Natural Theology, " and the "Bridgewater Treatises,'"^ 

* The authors of the " Bridge water Treatises " do not attempt to 
render the admirable and beneficent structures, agencies, and adap- 
tations of Nature which they so eloquently unfold religious truths 
by entwining them with the religious emotions ; nor do they draw 
from them, for the guidance of human conduct, rules invested with 
the authority of Divine wisdom and power. These omissions appa- 
rently had their source in the fact that the writers were restrained by 
the existing dogmas of religious faith from proceeding to such appli- 
cations of the truths which they unfolded. The consequence, however, 
has been, that their works remain barren of practical fruits. They 
are read and admired, and help to elevate and liberalise the minds of 
their readers in a general way ; but here their influence ends. Nobody 
acts on them. The authors of " Typical Forms and Special Ends in 
Creation ' ' appear also to have laboured under a similar restraint ; 
for while they have brought into a focus a mass of interesting eluci- 
dations of the prevalence of design and adaptation in Nature, they do 
not venture to apply to practical religion the grand truths which 
they exhibit. Bishop Butler, too, appears, in his Sermons on " Human 
Nature," and " Upon the Love of our Neighbour," to have made 
such a near approach to the practical doctrine of the present work, 
that I am led to think that the dogmas of his creed also restrained the 
full and free exercise of his profound and comprehensive understanding, 
and prevented him from pursuing the subject to its legitimate 
conclusions. 

If some future patron of human progress should offer a premium 
for a work carrying forward, by correcting and enlarging, the views 
which I am now feebly presenting in general outline, truths might 
be elicited which would prove eminently practical, and which, by 
being entwined with the religious emotions, would become highly 
influential in action. 



chap. VII.] THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 



103 



afford strong evidence in support of this proposition ; and 
in <; The Constitution of Man " I have endeavoured to show 
that the chief object of all the well-known arrangements 
of Nature is beneficent. 

Extending our inquiries to the human constitution and 
its adaptations, we discover that man is composed of 
chemical elements, and is brought into existence as a sen- 
tient, intelligent, moral, and religious being, according to 
fixed laws, and endowed with faculties adapted in the most 
striking manner to the condition in which the earth now 
exists : his muscles to the force of gravitation, which is a 
planetary force ; his eye and his faculty of Colouring to the 
sun's rays ; his lungs to the air ; his stomach to the vegetable 
and animal productions of the soil and sea ; his skin and 
sensitive nerves to the actual temperature of the earth and 
air • and his mental faculties to the whole objects of the 
arena in which lie is destined to live and act. The preced- 
ing pages are devoted to expositions and proofs of these 
propositions, and it is unnecessary to recapitulate them in 
detail. The facts appear to indicate that man, as he now 
exists, is part of an Institution. One remark, however, 
remains to be added. 

In "The Constitution of Man," I have attempted to 
show not only that the world has been instituted for 
benevolent purposes, but that even the contingent evil of 
pain has beneficent objects. When that Work appeared, it 
was objected that pain is the punishment of sin, inflicted in 
consequence of Adam's first transgression ; and the state- 
ment of the contrary was represented as an infidel denial of 
the authority of Scripture, in which the pains of child-birth 
are said to have been inflicted on Eve and all her sex as a 
retribution for her share in that unfortunate transaction. 
The argument, that as those pains are not suffered by all 
women, and are not equally severe in all whom they 
visit, they could not justly be regarded as an essential 



104 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. vn. 



portion of the order of Nature, was urged in vain. 
In the course of time, however, sulphuric e:he chloro- 
form, and other chemical compounds have been dis- 
covered, which, when inhaled, have the power of suspending 
sensibility to pain, without interrupting respiration and 
destroying life. The consequence is that child-birth and 
severe surgical operations are now accomplished without 
suffering. 

The inference to be drawn from such facts is well stated 
by Dr. Symonds, Physician to the Bristol Infirmary, in a 
letter published by him in the " British and Foreign 
Medical Review " for 1846 (Vol. XVII., p. 557) :— " Art, after 
all," says he, "is but Nature in a new form— a fresh 
arrangement of the forces of Nature, compelling them to 
work under new conditions." He adds : " I am not fond of 
arguments from final causes ; but can it be doubted that the 
various medicines ive possess were, as such, a part of the 
plan of the universe designed to have a relation to morbid 
states of living organisms, as much as esculent matters to 
healthy conditions 2 " 

The organism of man and animals possesses, up to a 
certain point, the power of repairing injuries which it may 
sustain ; and this power remains latent until called into 
action by the wants of the lacerated parts. If esculent 
matters have been adapted by God to the healthy condition 
of the human organism, does not this indicate that our 
digestive and assimilating organs, and their relations to 
those substances, are Institutions 1 But if that organism 
itself possesses a power of repairing injuries which are only 
prospective and contingent, and if there are also substances 
in Nature adapted to remove its morbid states when they 
occur, it is not a just inference that liability to disease also 
is a part of this Institution : pain and disease are not 
direct, essential, designed, and therefore inevitable elements 
of it, 



CHAP. TIT. ] 



THE WORLD AN INSTI1 UTION. 



105 



The adaptation of one portion of physical nature to 
another, by which man is benefited, also proclaims that 
this world, as it now exists, is an Institution. Coal and 
mineral beds are familiar examples ; and Dr. Lyon Playfair 
presents another which is not so generally known. "In 
1842," says he, "I had the pleasure of travelling with the 
Dean of Westminster and Liebig over different parts of 
England. Among other places, we visited a limestone in 
the neighbourhood of Clifton, where in former times 
saurian reptiles had been the pirates of the sea. There, 
along with the relics of the fishes on which they had preyed, 
were their own animal remains. Coprolites existed in great 
abundance, and proved the extraordinary number of the 
reptiles which must have existed. The interesting question 
arose as to whether these excretions of extinct animals con- 
tained the mineral ingredients of so much value in animal 
manure. The question was, in fact, not yet solved by the 
chemist, and we took specimens, in order to confirm by 
chemical analysis the views of the geologist. 

" After Liebig had completed their analysis, he saw that 
they might be made applicable to practical purposes. 
'What a curious and interesting subject for contemplation ! 
In the remains of an extinct animal world England is to 
find the means of increasing her wealth in agricultural 
produce, as she has already found the great support of her 
manufacturing industry in fossil fuel — the preserved matter 
of primeval forests — the remains of a vegetable world ! 
May this expectation be realised ! and may her excellent 
population be thus redeemed from poverty and misery ! ' 
I well recollect the storm of ridicule raised by these ex- 
pressions of the German philosopher ; and yet truth has 
triumphed over scepticism, and thousands of tons of similar 
animal remains are now used in promoting the fertility of 
our fields. The geological observer, in his search after 
evidences of ancient life, aided by the chemist, excavated 



10G 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. vn. 



extinct remains which produce new life to future gene- 
rations." * 

In regarding this world as an Institution, I do not pretend 
to solve all the difficulties which this view of it presents. 
Man, apparently, has advanced but a little way in his 
career of study and discovery, and probably is also far from 
the highest attainable improvement of his own physical and 
mental endowments. All that I aim at, therefore, is to 
direct, if possible, future inquiries into the right road of 
investigation, and to animate them with faith in a rich 
harvest of beneficial results, as the reward of studying 
Nature in the spirit of religion and truth. 

It is obvious that other objects than human instruction 
must have been contemplated by the great Author of the 
universe when He subjected animals to pain and death 
before man existed, and when He continues the same 
system in regions beyond the reach of man's intelligence 
and control. In "The Constitution of Man," I have en- 
deavoured to show that, in regard to man, suffering is chiefly 
incidental, that it is not the object of any portion of his 
organisation, and that, by obedience to the natural laws, it 
may in a great degree be avoided. In regard to the lower 
animals also, it appears to me that the suffering is not the 
normal, but the exceptional, condition of their being, and 
that destruction of individual life, which forms such an 
important element in the system of Nature, opens the 
way, directly and indirectly, to enjoyments which more 
than compensate the evils attending it. 

The dogmas of the most numerous and influential sects 
of Christians represent man's condition in this world as the 
wreck of a better system ; and many of them consider 
physical and animal nature also to have been involved in 
the catastrophe which befell him. 



* "Kecords of the School of Mimes," 18-52. The author was 
raised to the peerage as Baron Playfair in 1892. 



CHAP. VII.] 



THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 



107 



The following description of the nature of man, and of 
his relations to God, is given in the Larger Catechism of 
the Church of Scotland, which was ratified and established 
by Act of Parliament, dated 7th February, 1649— which 
the members of that Church are taught to venerate 
as an unquestionably just and correct interpretation of 
Scripture— and which, being thus entwined with their 
religious emotions, constitutes the basis of their religion : — 

" Q. 13. What hath God especially decreed concerning 
angels and men ? 

u A. God, by an eternal and immutable decree, out of 
His mere love, for the praise of His glorious grace, to be 
manifested in due time, hath selected some angels to 
glory ; and, in Christ, hath chosen some men to eternal life, 
and the means thereof : and also, according to His sovereign 
power, and the unsearchable 'counsel of His own will 
(whereby He extendeth or withholdeth favour as He 
pleaseth), hath passed by and foreordained the rest to 
dishonour and wrath, to be for their sin inflicted, to the 
praise of the glory of His justice. 

" Q. 14. How doth God execute His decrees ? 

"A. God executeth His decrees in the works of creation 
and providence according to His infallible foreknowledge, 
and the free and immutable counsel of His own will. 

"Q. 15. What is the work of creation ? 

"A. The work of creation is that wherein God did in 
the beginning, by the word, of His power, make of nothing 
the world, and all things therein, for Himself, within the 
space of six days, and all very good. 

" Q. 16. How did God create angels ? 

"A. God created all the angels spirits, immortal, holy, 
excelling in knowledge, mighty in power, to execute His 
commandments, and to praise His name, yet subject to 
change. 

" Q. 17. How did God create man ? 



10S 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. VII. 



"A. After God had made all other creatures, He created 
man, male and female ; formed the body of the man of the 
dust of the ground, and the woman of the rib of the man ; 
endued them with living, reasonable, and immortal souls ; 
made them after His own image, in knowledge, righteous- 
ness, and holiness, having the law of God written in their 
hearts, and power to fulfil it, with dominion over the 
creatures ; yet subject to fall. 

" Q. 18. What are God's works of providence? 

u A. God's works of providence are His most holy, wise, 
and powerful preserving and governing all His creatures; 
ordering them, and all their actions, to His own glory. 

" Q. 19. What is God's providence towards the angels'? 

"A. God, by His providence, permitted some of the 
angels, wilfully and irrecoverably, to fall into sin and 
damnation, limiting and ordering that, and all their sins, 
to His own glory, and established the rest in holiness 
and happiness ; employing them ail, at His pleasure, in the 
administration of His power, mercy, and justice. 

" Q. 20. What was the providence of God toward man 
in the estate in which he was created ? 

" A. The providence of God toward man in the estate 
in which he was created was the placing him in paradise, 
appointing him to dress it, giving him liberty to eat of the 
fruit of the earth; putting the creatures under his do- 
minion, and ordaining marriage for his help : affording him 
communion with Himself ; instituting the Sabbath ; enter- 
ing into a covenant of life with him, upon condition of 
personal, perfect, and perpetual obedience, of which the 
tree of life was a pledge ; and forbidding to eat of the tree 
of the knowledge of good and evil, upon the pain of death. 

" Q. 21. Did man continue in that estate wherein God 
at first created him ? 

" A. Our first parents being left to the freedom of their 
own will, through the temptation of Satan, transgressed the 



CHAP. TO.] THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 



10D 



commandment of God in eating the forbidden fruit ; and 
thereby fell from the estate of irmocency wherein they were 
created. 

" Q. 22. Did all mankind fall in that first transgression 1 

"A. The covenant being made with Adam as a public 
person, not for himself only, but for his posterity, all 
mankind descending from him by ordinary generation 
sinned in him, and fell with him, in that first transgression. 

" Q. 23. Into what estate did the fall bring mankind ? 

u A. The fall brought mankind into an estate of sin and 
misery. 

" Q. 24. What is sin ] 

"A. Sin is any want of conformity unto, or trans- 
gression of, any law of God, given as a rule to the reason- 
able creature. 

" Q. 25. Wherein consisteth the sinfulness of that estate 
whereinto man fell 1 

"A. The sinfulness of that estate whereinto man fell 
consisteth in the guilt of Adam's first sin, the want of that 
righteousness wherein he was created, and the corruption of 
his nature, whereby he is utterly indisposed, disabled, and 
made opposite unto all that is spiritually good, and wholly 
inclined to all evil, and that continually ; which is commonly 
called original sin, and from which do proceed all actual 
transgressions. 

"Q. 26. How is original sin conveyed from our first 
parents unto their posterity ? 

"A. Original sin is conveyed from our first parents 
unto their posterity by natural generation, so as all that 
proceed frcm them in that way are conceived and born 
in sin. 

" Q. 27. What misery did the fall bring upon mankind 1 
"i. The fall brought upon mankind the loss of com- 
munion with God, His displeasure and curse ; so as we are 
by nature children of wrath, bond-slaves to Satan, and 



110 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. vii. 



justly liable to all punishments in this world, and that 
which is to come. 

" Q. 28. What are the punishments of sin in this world ? 

"A. The punishments of sin in this world are either 
inward, as blindness of mind, a reprobate sense, strong 
delusions, hardness of heart, horror of conscience, and vile 
affections ; or outward, as the curse of God upon the 
creatures for our sakes, and all other evils that befall 
us in our bodies, names, estates, relations, and employ- 
ments ; together with death itself. 

" Q. 29. What are the punishments of sin in the world 
to come 1 

"A. The punishments of sin in the world to come are 
everlasting separation from the comfortable presence of 
God, and most grievous torments in soul and body, without 
intermission, in hell-fire for ever."' 

" Of old," says a writer in the North British Review, 
" the earth was regarded as itself the centre of a system, 
and the heavenly bodies as moving round it. Even when 
there was no direct reference to this erroneous theory 
of the nature of celestial objects, it imparted a false light or 
colouring to every idea of terrestrial things." (Vol. XVII., 
p. 68.) This correctly expresses what appears to me to be 
the inevitable effect of the doctrine that this world, such 
as it now exists, is not an Institution, but a wreck. It 
imparts " a false light or colouring to every idea of terres- 
trial things.' 7 

In the Catechism, then, there is a direct contradiction to 
the notion that this world, such as it now exists, is an 
Institution. If the evidence before adduced is sufficient to 
support the latter hypothesis, then the hypothesis of a 
wreck is necessarily excluded : if not, we must embrace 
it with all its consequences. The solution of the question 
is of momentous importance. Before the religious senti- 
ments and the reflecting intellect of the people can be 



chap, vil.] THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 



Ill 



induced to reverence and obey the precepts of God 
addressed to them in the order of Nature, they must be 
taught that Nature is still such as God made it, and 
that wherever it has been thoroughly understood, it appears 
to reflect wisdom and goodness. 

There can be no sacredness in Nature, if it be intrinsically 
disordered. In studying it, we cannot come into com- 
munion with God, if, through either its inherent derange- 
ment or our own natural obliquity of mind, His wisdom 
and goodness are not discernible in it ; while, if they 
are discernible, it cannot be justly said that man has lost 
communion with his Maker. If the Divine institutions 
and adaptations in Nature are calculated to promote the 
enjoyment of man, and to instruct, improve, guide, and ele- 
vate him as a moral, religious, and intellectual administrator 
of this world, he cannot be truly said to be under God's 
" wrath and curse." 

Further, if the practical efficacy of religion in guiding 
human conduct depends on its harmony with the order 
of Nature, then this representation of the world and its 
relations to God is not only speculatively erroneous, but 
constitutes a positive and important obstacle to the progress 
of Divine truth. It tends to blind the intellect, and to 
mislead the moral and religious sentiments of the people, 
and thereby to retard their advance in practical religion, 
virtue, and civilisation. 

Incredible as it may appear, there are millions of 
excellent persons whose religious emotions have been so 
interwoven with the doctrines of this and similar Catechisms 
that they are painfully affected when they hear the doctrines 
called in question. When we point out to them that the 
facts brought to light by geological researches and compara- 
tive anatomy contradict the dogma that the present consti- 
tution and condition of the lower animals are the consequence 
of " the curse of God upon the creatures for our sakes 55 ; 



112 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chat. vn. 



that chemical, anatomical, and physiological facts show that 
the ground and the human organsim are adapted to each other 
in beneficent relationship, and contradict the text, " Cursed 
is the ground for thy sake " as it has been generally inter- 
preted ; and when we assure them that the authority 
on which they believe the contrary doctrine is only that of 
a Church, and of a Catechism compiled by fallible men, all 
of whom were ignorant of the sciences of Geology, Chemistry, 
Comparative and Human Anatomy and Physiology, and 
the physiology of the brain, and many of whom were 
unacquainted with any other natural science — we only give 
them pain and provoke their anger. 

Did not evil consequences to society flow from this 
belief, it might be unjustifiable to assail it : but persons 
thus trained fear science, from the suspicion that it is 
at variance with their creed, and openly or covertly resist 
its introduction into schools. In Scotland, they insist that 
their Catechism shall form the basis of instruction in 
national schools ; and as they would be affronted were 
we to assert that they deliberately intend to teach con- 
tradictions, they must mean to twist all natural science 
into apparent accordance with its doctrines, or to exclude 
scientific instruction altogether. 

The latter is the course hitherto generally pursued. 
Nevertheless, the dogma that human nature is wholly 
corrupt contradicts the facts that every faculty has a 
legitimate sphere of action, and that vice and crime are 
only abuses which, to an extent at present unascertained, 
may be prevented by more thorough and practical instruction 
and training. Being opposed to a natural fact, it forces the 
individual who embraces it either to shut his eyes against 
the true order of Nature, and thus to mistake at once 
his duty to himself and to society, or to attempt to believe 
in contradictions : a process which perverts the moral 
faculties, paralyses the intellect, and renders consistent 



chap, til] THE WORLD AN INSTITUTION. 113 

action impossible. By giving a false direction to our 
intellectual faculties in searching for the path of duty, 
by maintaining our feelings, opinions, and practical habits, 
either dissociated from our religious emotions, or, if joined 
with them, then in some degree at war with- God's natural 
institutions, it brings upon us many of the miseries which 
it describes — viz., the natural penalties of error— and by 
this means supports its own authority and prolongs our 
degradation. 



I 



114 



CHAPTER VIII 

The Sacked^ ess of Nature* 

If this world is an Institution, and if God is its Author and 
Governor, it appears to be the duty and the interest of man 
to regard it with reverence, to study its arrangements, and, 
as far as possible, to act in accordance with the rules which 
it indicates for the guidance of his conduct. We must 
cease to be affronted with it because it and our own organism 
are material : to revolt from it because our bodies and 
those of the lower animals appear to be constructed on one 
plan, to run similar courses on earth, and to be adapted by 
surpassing wisdom, each species to its circumstances, and 
all to the general laws of Nature. We must approach 
Nature in the spirit of little children, humble, eager for 
instruction, and willing to obey. To reach this state of 
mind, we must lay aside that practical atheism which blinds 
us to the laws of God's providence, manifested in Nature, 
and devote our best energies to discover the Divine Will 
revealed in that record. Having discovered that Will, we 
must entwine it with our religious emotions, constitute it 
our religion, and make obedience to it the business of our 
lives. 

If we approach the consideration of the world in this 
spirit, we shall find that every faculty stands in admirable 
adaptation to external nature, to the other faculties, and to 
God ; and that enjoyment, improvement, and elevation of 
character are the objects of the whole, while pain, sorrow, 
and premature death are only contingent consequences of 
abnormal conditions. 



chap, viii.] THE SACREDNESS OF NATURE. 



115 



Man is ushered into life not only naked, but with an 
organism that imperatively demands clothing and shelter ; 
with digestive organs that constantly require new supplies 
of food ; and with faculties that desire property, social con- 
sideration, and multifarious productions of skill and industry 
for their gratification. The dogmas represent this state of 
things as a "curse" inflicted in consequence of Adam's first 
transgression. Viewed as a designed Institution, it wears 
a widely different aspect. The earth is endowed with 
properties calculated to yield products which man may call 
forth by the application of his skill and labour, and which 
he may fashion into food, clothing, houses, ships, and in- 
numerable articles of utility and ornament, for his own 
gratification. 

God has bestowed on him bones, muscles, and a nervous 
system which generate strength within him, and render 
labour agreeable. He has given him pleasure, recurring 
several times a day, in repairing, by the use of wholesome 
food, the waste of organic substance occasioned by the 
exertions of labour. He has given him intellectual faculties 
which enable him to acquire knowledge and skill, and also 
moral and religious emotions to refine, elevate, and direct 
him in fulfilling the duties which he is appointed to perform 
on earth. Among these are faculties of Ideality, Wonder, 
Veneration and Hope, Causality and Comparison, which, 
carrying him beyond this earthly sphere, enable him to 
penetrate to some extent into the regions of boundless space 
and endless time, there to trace the power and wisdom of 
God, and to expand his own nature by intercommunion 
with the greatness and the glories of the universe. 

Man's faculties enable him also to explore the depths of 
the earth and sea, the summits of the mountains, and the 
recesses of rocks ; and there, in the minutest as in the 
grandest forms of Nature, he discovers desigu, order, beauty, 
and adaptation. When properly trained and directed, his 
I 2 



• 



116 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. Yin. 



religious emotions are capable of investing all these minute 
and stupendous objects, their properties and modes of action, 
with a holy reverence, as manifestations of Divine power, 
wisdom, and goodness ; and when things are so viewed, the 
inherent adaptation of his faculties to them all renders it 
a gratification of the highest order to enter into this temple 
of the Most High, to act as ministering servants in fulfilling 
the Divine designs, and to reap the joys which have been 
connected with obedience to the Divine laws. 

When viewed in this light, labour ceases to be regarded 
as a " curse," and becomes holy and honourable, a privilege 
and a boon. The understanding then willingly tries to 
discover the conditions which must be observed to invest it 
with its pleasing and beneficial qualities, and how to avoid 
the course which renders it painful or abortive. If the 
world is an Institution, if physical nature is benevolently 
and wisely adapted to man's bodily and mental qualities, 
and these to it, then, when labour is attended with suffering, 
aberration from the proper conditions of that relationship 
may be safely predicated, and we should be taught, trained, 
and encouraged, in reliance on Divine wisdom and goodness, 
to search out the sources of our errors, and, if possible, to 
dry them up. 

To turn our thoughts in disgust from labour as a " curse," 
to regard its inconveniences as a punishment, and to leap at 
once in imagination into another sphere of existence in 
which there shall be neither toil nor sorrow, as a refuge 
from the evils which our unskilful arrangements produce 
in this life, is not religion nor honour to God, but is really 
indulging in a maudlin sentimental egotism. 

If labour is not a curse, but a boon, all our necessary 
duties and occupations, when fulfilled in conformity with 
the Divine law, become not only useful and pleasurable, 
but morally right and religious, and the whole aspect of 
the world is changed from one of gloom and misery to one 



chap, viii.] THE SACREDNESS OF KATURE. 



117 



of hope and encouragement to virtuous exertion. The 
grand objection to the proposition that this world is an 
Institution is founded on the sufferings which have afflicted 
humanity in all ages and conditions of life. It is said that 
the individual is racked with pain or becomes the victim 
of sorrow : that the young, loving, and happy husband and 
wife are engulfed in irremediable poverty, or are separated 
by death : that their hearts are wrung with anguish by the 
death of their beloved offspring : that ruin's stern plough- 
share often levels in the dust the fortunes that should have 
been the reward of the toils of life, and the comfort of 
declining years : that friends forsake us, scoundrels betray 
us, fire consumes our property, and floods extinguish our 
lives, and that hence all is vanity and vexation of spirit. 
We are told that all this misery has only one great object — 
to wean our affections from the earth, and to concentrate 
them on God and heaven. 

As declamation, this objection appears formidable ; but 
when the facts on which it is reared are more closely 
investigated, their weight is greatly diminished. In sur- 
veying the phenomena of life, it is difficult to forget the 
observation of Mr. Robert Forsyth, in his Work on "Moral 
Science," that as this world is the only one of which we have 
experience, it is illogical to infer from its disorders that 
God has made a better world in which to compensate us for 
the evils which He has appointed us to endure in this. It 
appears more respectful to our Maker to doubt whether we 
are rightly understanding His institutions, and are acting 
properly our own part under them, before we condemn them 
in this querulous tone, and fly to heaven as a refuge from 
the alleged imperfections of earth. 

I beg leave, therefore, to direct the attention of the 
reader to the exposition of the sources of some of our chief 
sufferings given in the preceding pages, and to solicit his 
serious consideration of the question, whether it is within 



US 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. VIII. 



the power of man in any degree to mitigate or avoid them 
— and if so, to what extent they are the results of our own 
imperfect knowledge and erroneous modes of action, or of 
inherent imperfections in the constitution of Nature. 
There are — 

1st, Our sufferings from the operations of physical 
nature. 

2nd, Our sufferings from disease and death. 

3rd. The sufferings that arise from misdirection of our 
emotional faculties, and from failure in our plans of life. 

4th, The evils that arise from placing individuals in 
situations for which their natural qualities do not fit them. 
In " The Constitution of Man'" I have endeavoured to 
throw light on these and similar objections to the doctrine 
that Divine benevolence pervades the order of Nature. 

This work is not designed as a full investigation of the 
difficult and important questions which present themselves 
to a reflecting mind on surveying the phenomena of life : 
but merely as an exposition of a useful method according 
to which, in my opinion, this inquiry might be conducted. 
I shall here add only a few observations on the provisions 
made by Nature for the mitigation of some of the sufferings 
to which man is liable when they have actually, and from 
whatever cause, overtaken us. 

I have adverted to a process which an injury to our 
bones or muscles calls into play in our organism, in order to 
repair the injured tissues, and restore the part to health and 
strength. An analogous provision is instituted in the case 
of our mental afflictions. Every faculty receives pleasure 
from the presence of its objects, and suffers pain on their 
removal. Xo one objects to the first alternative, but many 
object to the second : yet, it is difficult to imagine how the 
first could exist without liability to the second. The effect 
of this order of things is to bind us to the objects of our 
desires by a double tie — the pleasure of enjoyment and the 



chap, viii.] THE S AC BED X ESS OF NATURE. 



110 



pain of deprivation. The mother's joy in her healthy, 
beautiful, virtuous, and intelligent child is intense : but 
her grief in losing it is commensurately great. Our phi- 
losophy and our religion must embrace all the phenomena of 
Nature, and must not shrink from investigating their causes. 
To some, accordingly, the death of offspring by disease or 
accident is a dire calamity ; by others it may be secretly 
felt as a pleasure. It is differences in the constitution of 
the individuals, influenced by their circumstances, that 
give rise to these differences in feeling. 

In the human mother, in whom Philoprogenitiveness is 
strong and the Moral Sentiments are deficient, there is an 
intense love of her children while they are young, but it 
decreases as they grow older, and almost entirely ceases 
when they become men and women. At that age they 
become the objects of the moral affections, which in her are 
feeble ; and hence her indifference. This is no theory, but 
the statement of a fact which I have repeatedly observed. 
It shows that by the order of Xature parental love decreases 
in women, and finally disappears when the object of it no 
longer requires its exercise. 

It is in virtue of the same benevolent arrangement of 
Nature that active and laborious individuals suffer less from 
mental afflictions than the luxurious and the idle. The 
mother whose duties call on her for constant exertion of 
muscular strength and intellectual thought is sooner 
relieved from the pain that attends the loss of her child 
than another who, nursed in the lap of luxury, has no im- 
perative calls to excite her physical powers or her mental 
faculties. 

By the decay of power and activity in the brain and the 
nervous system as age advances, Xature diminishes our 
attachment to the objects which we shall soon be called on 
to leave. From year to year the circle of our interests 
contracts; in reading the newspapers, for example, we first 



120 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. viii. 



pass over the scientific and abstract discussions ; next we 
omit the foreign intelligence ; by-and-by we care little about 
distant occurrences even in our own country ; and we end by 
confining our attention chiefly to the incidents of our 
neighbourhood and of our private sphere. 

The same benevolent preparation of our feelings to meet 
our destiny is apparent in the case even of premature death. 
I have heard physicians who had passed forty years in 
practice remark that they had rarely met with patients 
who were unwilling to die. The changes which take place 
in the constitution, and which end in death, . are attended by 
a corresponding influence on the mind. Its energy is 
weakened, interest in its objects diminishes, and thus we 
become prepared to die. Many years ago I asked one of the 
gentlemen who accompanied Sir John Franklin in his first 
expedition to the Arctic regions how he felt when strength 
for further exertions had failed, and when the party were 
seated before what appeared to be their last fire : " Did you 
think painfully of the friends whom you expected never to 
meet again, of the home which you had left, and which con- 
trasted so strongly with the frozen wilderness in which you 
were perishing ? What sustained you in that hour of 
trial?" His reply was: "Home and the moon possessed 
equal interest in my feelings. We were so completely ex- 
hausted in mind and body by cold, starvation, and fatigue, 
that our whole interests were concentrated, in the fire. My 
chief distress arose when it came to my turn to rise and 
place fresh timber on it to support the combustion. We 
knew that a party of Indians had been sent from the nearest 
settlement to search for and to succour us, and that on 
their finding us before our fire was extinguished depended 
our only chance of life. This, although nearly a forlorn 
hope, was still possible ; but, nevertheless, the pain attending 
the effort to rise and move the timber extinguished all other 
considerations." 



CHAP. VIII.] 



THE SA CREDNESS GF NATURE. 



121 



A narrative closely similar was given by the captain of 
the American ship Oswego, which was stranded on the coast 
of Africa. He was made captive by the natives, stripped 
naked, placed on the back of a camel, and taken across the 
desert under a burning sun. For three or four days his 
misery was so intense that he searched for the means of 
committing suicide, but could not find them. After that 
time, a stupor came over him ; and during three months' 
travelling and living in the same circumstances, he had con- 
sciousness only of existence and of passing scenes, but little 
suffering. He was at length given up at an English settle- 
ment on the coast, and many months elapsed before his 
nervous system fully recovered its usual powers. 

These instances show that Nature sets a limit to our 
sufferings, whether the causes of them have been avoidable 
or unavoidable, and does not leave us in hopeless misery 
when no further sources of enjoyment are open to us. 

In the prevailing religious creeds little or no notice is 
taken of the benevolent provisions of Divine wisdom and 
goodness ; and in consequence, the benefits of a religious 
alliance on the prospective mitigation of our sufferings 
which they are calculated to afford are to a great extent 
lost, 

We need a new Eeformation ; and if the views before 
presented have to any reasonable extent a foundation in 
Nature, natural religion may now assume a new form, and 
come forth with a degree of beneficence and power which it 
has never hitherto possessed. 

The reader is referred to the elucidation given in Chap. 
II. of the complex character of religion, and to the 
evidence there adduced that it is constituted by entwining 
intellectual ideas with the religious emotions, and that 
these ideas may possess almost any character, provided they 
are not in flagrant discord with the predominant mental 
condition of the people. 



122 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. vnx. 



If these two propositions are sound, it appears to follow 
that instead of the Christian, the Mahommedan, the Hindu, 
and other religions resting on the sacred books which are 
represented as their foundations, they repose on the basis of 
the natural religious faculties of man : and that the books 
are the mere embodiments of the views of God, man, and 
the world, entertained by certain individuals who aspired 
to give specific forms and directions to the religious emotions 
of the people. The soundness and usefulness of the in- 
tellectual ideas which by this means they formed into 
religious dogmas will be correctly measured by the extent 
to which they embody, or harmonise with, the institutions 
and laws of God in Xature. Wherever the founders of 
these religions have converted false views of God, or 
erroneous interpretations of the course of His administration 
in Xature, into religious dogmas, and have thereby con- 
stituted them sacred articles of faith and rules of conduct, 
to be believed and followed— but never to be questioned or 
tried by any appeal, except to the sacred books themselves— 
they have misdirected the understandings and corrupted the 
principles of action of the people whom they professed to 
guide and instruct. 

Before sound, useful, and practical intellectual ideas can 
be associated with the religious emotions, so as to constitute 
a really true religion, we must possess correct notions of 
what we are capable of understanding concerning God, and 
His mode of governing the world ; and also sound views of 
oar own nature, and of our relations to Him and His 
institutions. When this knowledge is entwined with the 
religious emotions, it becomes sacred and religious ; and, 
from being thus a hallowed embodiment of the real order of 
Nature, it is highly practical. It enlarges and improves, as 
knowledge of GocVs laws advances ; it harmonises with all 
truth ; and if God be at once the Author of Nature and the 
Creator of the human body and mind, such a religion 



chap, viii.] THE SA CRELNESS OF NATURE. 



123 



must be wisely adapted to the wants, wishes, and welfare 
of man. 

The knowledge now alluded to must rest on evidence 
that is open to observation. At present, mental science, 
as generally taught, is a chaos, and cannot be used with 
advantage in religious investigations. 

Another important — indeed a fundamental — portion of 
such a faith is a correct notion of what our minds are capable 
of conceiving concerning God. If we form erroneous notions 
on this point, and embody them as dogmas in our religion, 
we confound, bewilder, and mislead the weak in mind, and 
outrage and repel the strong. 

If we were permitted to discover the intimate conscious- 
ness even of excellent, sincere, and intelligent persons, we 
should find that^ extraordinary discrepancies of views and 
feelings exist in their minds on the subject of God and 
religion, and that an elucidation of the range of tlie human 
faculties in this and all other departments of knowledge is 
as indispensable to a sound religion as to a true and useful 
philosophy. 

I have already remarked that the Bible does not reveal 
God, but commences by assuming His existence. "In the 
beginning God created the heavens and the earth.'" Sub- 
sequently, several descriptions are given of Him and His 
attributes ; but none of these do more than ascribe to Him 
human qualities, enlarged, purified, and exalted to the 
utmost stretch of our imaginations. Thus, man exists in 
time, and God exists in endless time : i.e., He is everlasting. 
Man possesses some power, God unlimited power — He is 
almighty ; man exists in limited space, God in unlimited 
space— He is everywhere present ; man knows some things, 
God knows all things: man is benevolent, God is long- 
suffering and merciful ; man has a sentiment of truth and 
justice, God is perfect truth and perfect justice. In the 
Old Testament, human passions even are ascribed to God ; 



124 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION, [chap, vm 



He is jealous, angry, placable, and so forth. It is in vain to 
condemn descriptions of the Divine Being ascribing to Him 
human qualities, for we cannot conceive any object or being 
that does not lie within the limits of cognition of our 
faculties. The inquiry, therefore, which I have attempted 
to institute — " What is man capable of discovering and com- 
prehending concerning God V — is not a barren speculation, 
but one of a practical and important nature. 

Dr. Johnson defines the substantive " Worship ;; to mean 
" Adoration ; religious act of reverence " : " to worship 93 is 
' : to adore; to honour or venerate with religious rites."' 
Again, "to adore" is "to worship with external homage,'' 5 
Xow, the external rites in which we embody our <; worship,"' 
" reverence, : ' , or " homage 91 will obviously bear a relation to 
our motives in worshipping ; and these will be influenced 
by our opinions of the character of the Being whom we 
adore. Tribes who ascribe the lower passions to their 
deities institute immoral rites and ceremonies in honour of 
them. Those nations who regard God as cruel and revenge- 
ful sacrifice animals, and some of them men, to appease 
Him. Others who ascribe to Him self-esteem and love of 
approbation (their own predominant qualities) offer Him 
praise and glorification, and try to please Him by expressing 
their own consciousness (generally with much exaggeration) 
of abject meanness and unworthiness. 

If I am right in saying that although God has not given 
us faculties fitted to comprehend Himself, yet He has given 
us powers which enable us to understand His will in relation 
to ourselves, and to other beings over whom He has given us 
some degree of influence and control, and that in the order 
of Xature He has revealed duties which we are capable of 
performing, then we may reasonably consider whether the 
rites of our religious worship should partake of the character 
of attempts to please God as a Being possessing human 
qualities, or be directed to do Him honour, reverence, and 



CHAP. VIII.] 



THE SAG REDNESS OF NATURE. 



125 



homage by studying, expounding, and obeying His will as 
thus revealed to us. All existing forms of worship should 
be tried by their relation to what we can comprehend of the 
nature of God, and of His will. 

If without irreverence I might borrow an illustration 
from the relation between man and the lower animals, I 
should remark chat it appears possible for one being to 
comprehend portions of the will of another, although he 
cannot conceive adequately the nature of that other. The 
dog, for instance, cannot comprehend the nature of the 
shepherd, but he can learn the shepherd's will to be that 
he, the dog, should tend the sheep ; and that the dog, 
without attempting to know more of the shepherd's nature 
than this portion of his will, may obey it and preserve the 
flock. The horses which in our circuses are trained to 
dance, to tire pistols, to fetch tea-kettles, and to perform 
other feats of a like kind, do not comprehend the nature of 
the men who teach them to do these things, nor apparently 
do they understand the object or design of the actions them- 
selves ; but they seem to understand the will of the men so 
far as it relates to the actions required of them, for they 
do the things they are taught. 

We should all agree that the dog sadly mistook his own 
capacities and his relations to man if, instead of hearkening 
to the shepherd's voice, obeying his will, and guarding the 
flock, he turned a deaf ear to the one and set the other at 
defiance, and commenced a grand speculation on the nature 
of his master, and his attributes. We should be still more 
astonished at the want of a due sense of his own deficiencies 
and position if the dog, in the midst of his speculation on 
this, to him, incomprehensible subject, and of his neglect of 
duty, ever and anon turned up his eyes and raised his fore- 
paws to his master, and muttered indications of intense 
admiration and veneration for him, calliug him a being 
possessed of every faculty which canine consciousness can 



126 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. VIII. 



admire in the highest state of perfection and in unlimited 
degree. 

And yet. ignorant and superstitious men do something 
analogous to this when 3 instead of " walking humbly " with 
God, studying His Institutions, and obeying His will, they 
ascribe to Him their own qualities, praise Him, and implore 
Him to protect them as His devoted worshippers : they all 
the while violating His laws. In the words of Dr. Fellowes, 
" The only use which some religionists make of their under- 
standing is to perplex it by inquiring into the nature of 
God. They leave the easy and feasible, to attempt the 
impossible. They forsake the clear and the simple, to lose 
themselves in a region of clouds and darkness. For how 
can the finite hope to comprehend the infinite, the material 
the spiritual, the temporal the eternal \ God can be known 
only in His works. There His agency is seen. There 
His will may be traced ; there His laws be developed. But 
what His nature is. or how He exists, must ever be past 
finding out. It is enough for us to know that He exists ; 
but how He exists, it is vain, and indeed presumptuous, to 
inquire.' 3 # 

Christian believers institute forms of worship in honour 
of God corresponding to their peculiar notion of His cha- 
racter, derived from the Bible. In 1839 I visited, on a 
Sunday, the establishment of Shaking Quakers at Xiska- 
yuna, near Albany, in the United States of America. 
Visitors were freely admitted as spectators of their worship. 

The service began by one of the men delivering some 
sensible moral precepts ; after which, as the day was 
warm, the men stripped off their coats and laid aside their 
hats : while the women took off their shawls and bonnets. 
They then commenced singing and dancing ; at the same 

* "The Religion of the Universe," etc., by Robert Fellowes, 
LL.D. London, 1836. 



chap, viii.] THE SACREDXESS OF NATURE. 



127 



time waving their hands, which they held in the attitude of 
the fore-feet of the kangaroo. While singing, they knelt 
occasionally : and at other times several of them took 
their station in the middle of the floor and sang, while the 
rest danced round them. Their tunes were merry mea- 
sures, with strongly marked time, such as are played in 
farces and pantomimes. By-and-by some of them began to 
bend their bodies forwards, to shake from side to side, and 
to whirl round. A favourite motion was to let the trunk of 
the body drop downwards, with a sudden jerk to one side, 
care being always taken to recover the perpendicular before 
the equilibrium was lost. The head and trunk were drawn 
up with another jerk. In all their shakings and contortions 
they never lost the step in their dance, nor ran against each 
other. 

During these gesticulations some of the strangers laughed. 
One of the male Shakers singling out a young lady whom 
he had observed committing this breach of decorum, ad- 
dressed her thus : " Young woman, you laugh too much. 
We are a-worshippin ; God : we want you to be quiet ; 
that's all we desire."" ("Notes on America/" 5 VoL II., p. 302, 
and Appendix, Xo. II.) 

This, then, was worship calculated to do honour to God 
and benefit to man, according to the notions which these 
people had formed of the Supreme Being. It will be ob- 
served that there is no natural relation between these cere- 
monies and the religious emotions of man ; and that their 
sacred character as acts of worship was only communicated 
to them by artificially associating them with the natural 
emotions. 

Do I greatly err in supposing that had their leaders 
expounded to them the order of God's government on earth, 
and enforced obedience to His laws as rules of conduct 
revealed in His works, and thereby called forth in their 
minds holy, reverential, and grateful emotions towards 



12S 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. viii. 



God, and more earnest desires to discharge their own 
duties, the worship would probably have been not less 
acceptable to God, and perhaps more edifying and beneficial 
to themselves ? In St. Peter's magnificent cathedral in 
Rome, and in splendid churches in other cities, I have 
often been a spectator of the celebration of High Mass and 
other gorgeous ceremonies of the Roman Catholic religion. 
These, too, were acts of Divine worship, intended to do 
honour to God and to lead the people to holy living. But 
here also the sacred character as worship was not inherent 
in the ceremonies, but was communicated to them by 
training. 

Were I to ask a sound Scotch Presbyterian whether, in 
his opinion, such a substitute as I have supposed to be 
made for the worship of the Shaking Quakers would be 
admissible in their case, he probably would not be' greatly 
shocked, but would calmly consider the merits of the 
question. If, however, I were to hint that his own worship 
consists in the expression, in prayers, psalms, and sermons, 
of the dogmas quoted above, and other similar notions of 
God and man ; to suggest that there is no inherent sacred- 
ness in them, and to ask whether they so completely accord 
with the highest views attainable of the character of God's 
administration on earth, and are so perfectly calculated to 
do honour to Him, and to direct the moral, religious, and 
intellectual faculties of the people towards holy, pure, and 
beneficent conduct, that such a substitution would in this 
case also be admissible — I should probably be accused of 
profanity, and call forth a storm of indignation. 

And why so ? Because in youth these dogmas and forms 
of worship had been entwined with the religious emotions 
of the Presbyterian, had become sacred in his mind, and 
now constitute his mode of expressing love, reverence, 
gratitude, obedience, and every other holy emotion towards 
God. Why do not the same feelings arise in his mind wher 



chap, viii.] THE SACREDNESS OF NATURE. 



120 



it is suggested that the substitute proposed might be an 
improvement on the worship of the Shakers or Roman 
Catholics? Simply because his religious emotions have 
never been entwined with their ceremonies, and he is able 
to judge of them by his unbiassed reason. In point of fact, 
all forms of Divine worship derive their existence and 
efficacy from their being expressions of the longings and 
aspirations of the religious emotions inherent in the human 
mind ; and their power over the devotee depends, not on 
their conformity to absolute truth, but on the degree in 
which the intellect is satisfied with the dogmas, forms, or 
ceremonies through which its activity finds expression. 

If this view be correct, it will be as impossible to ex- 
tinguish religion as to supersede music, painting, sculpture, 
dress, or any other thing which is desired in consequence of 
wants, and supplied by the activity of faculties inherent in 
the human constitution ; and the only important considera- 
tion is, What kind of worship stands in the truest and most 
direct relationship to the whole faculties of man in their 
most cultivated and enlightened condition 1 Is it such 
dogmas and ceremonies as have just been mentioned ? or a 
service based on the laws of God and on our relationship to 
Him and them as revealed in Nature ) 

Mr. Angus Macpherson, in an excellent little work on 
"English Education,"* asks "those who maintain the 
indispensability of the Greek and Horn an classics in edu- 
cation": "Is it not more probable that the proper and 
legitimate means for training the intellect co-existed with 
the intellect itself, not since the period of the rise and fall 
of the Greek and Roman empires, but since the beginning of 
the world ? " In a like manner I ask whether, if there is a 
God, and if He has conferred religions emotions on man, it 
is not probable that He has constituted the order of this 

* Glasgow : David Robertson ; 1854. 

J 



130 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. Tin. 



world in harmony with these emotions, and fitted His 
natural Institutions, and the lessons which they teach, 
when regarded as manifestations of His will to become 
objects of reverential respect and obedience, and thus to 
constitute elements in Divine worship ? 

It would be a strange contradiction equally to our moral, 
religious, and intellectual emotions and perceptions if the 
case were otherwise, and if such ceremonies as I have de- 
scribed were sacred, and God's will revealed in Nature 
were profane ; nevertheless, the religious dogmas of all 
nations repudiate this view ! The only explanation of this 
rejection that I can conjecture is — that until the order of 
external Nature and the functions of the mind, by means 
of which the adaptation of the world to our faculties be- 
comes manifest, were discovered, the relationship of Nature 
to our religious emotions, although in all ages felt and 
recognised as existing, could not become the foundation 
of a practical religion. 

It is objected, however, that if we adopt rules of conduct 
founded on the order of Nature, God and religion become 
equally unnecessary ; and that knowledge of these rules, 
and obedience to them, for the sake of the good consequent 
on obedience, is all-sufficient for our welfare. In answer, I 
remark — 1st, That men in whom the religious emotions and 
the intellectual faculties are developed to an average extent, 
believe intuitively in the existence of a Power and Intelli- 
gence above and beyond Nature ; # and 2nd, That there is 
abundant evidence in Nature that this Being has consti- 
tuted the human faculties in relationship to Himself and 
His works ; among which faculties are religious emotions. 

This will be regarded by some readers as begging the 
whole question ; but, as I have already stated the grounds 
on which these views ;are entertained, I shall here only 



* See page 39. 



CHAP, viil] THE SACREDNESS OF NATURE. 



131 



apply them in answering the foregoing objection. The 
objectors, although they dispense with a God and with re- 
ligion, will probably admit that we are placed in this world 
to discharge duties to ourselves and our fellow-men. Well, 
then, the more numerous and the higher the motives which 
can be supplied to induce us to discharge these duties, the 
greater will be the probability of their being well dis- 
charged. 

It is the duty of a soldier, for example, when so com- 
manded, to storm a fortress, at the peril of life and limb. 
He is under military discipline, which provides that if he 
refuse he shall be shot. This is one motive, and it might 
be supposed to include all others. But if we add to it the 
desire of the applause of his officers, his comrades, and his 
country, constituting together the love of glory, we raise 
and strengthen his resolution by another and higher motive. 
Add a sense of moral duty to his country and his king, and 
a third, and a still higher, motive comes into play. 

And those who believe in God say : Add the religious 
emotions, which infuse new fire into the other faculties, 
elevate them, and render them holy, and you will then kindle 
in the soldier a great moral and religious excitement, before 
which death and danger will lose all their terrors. An 
army composed of men in this condition of mind, if equally 
numerous and as well fed, equipped, drilled, and com- 
manded, as an opposing force, animated by no motive but 
the fear of the Provost-Marshal, would sweep it from the 
field like a whirlwind. In the late war* the Emperor of 
Russia appealed strongly to the religious emotions of his 
people ; and in the Ironsides of Cromwell's army we may see 
the effects of such an influence on the soldier's courage. 

The foregoing illustration is applicable to all the duties 
and trials of life. The religious emotions appear to me to 

* The Eusso-Turkish War of 1855-56. 

J 2 



132 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. vin. 



have been bestowed to sanctify, elevate, invigorate, and 
ennoble every act of our other faculties ; and although 
hitherto they have never been so applied with due intelli- 
gence, and therefore have not been applied successfully, I 
can discover no adequate reason for despairing that this 
will yet be accomplished. The grand obstacle in the way 
is the existence and deep-rooted influence of the prevailing 
dogmas ; but, if the views now advanced are founded in 
truth, these will be gradually superseded by sounder and 
more practical interpretations of Scripture. 

It is further objected, that if we should base religion 
upon the will of God manifested in Nature, there could be 
no general agreement in doctrine and practice, because every 
one sees Nature through the medium of his own faculties, 
and these differ in relative power and cultivation indifferent 
individuals. This objection is to some extent well founded ; 
but it is equally applicable to religion founded on a super- 
natural revelation, as is demonstrated by the different 
interpretations put upon the Bible by the different Christian 
sects. 

It is certain that the impressions which each individual 
receives from the external world are modified by the con- 
dition of his own mental constitution. Light does not exist 
to a man born blind, nor melody to one in whom the sense 
of Tune is very deficient ; colour is not fully and accurately 
perceived by one in whom the sense of Colouring is small, 
nor is the beauty of Nature discernible by an individual in 
whom Ideality is very imperfectly developed. Neither does 
one in whom the moral and religious emotions are weak, 
but in whom those of the animal propensities and intel- 
lectual faculties are strong, on surveying external Nature, 
receive vivid impressions of benevolence and goodness as 
characteristics pervading it. On the contrary, the represen- 
tations of it and of man's condition embodied in the Cate- 
chism quoted above, appear to him to be nearer the truth. 



CHAP, viii.] THE SACEEDNESS OF NATURE. 133 

The only answer that can be given to the objections against 
Nature, urged by persons thus constituted, is that men with 
better developments of mind and more cultivation receive 
higher impressions from it, and that the presumption is 
stronger in favour of its being really such as these perceive 
it, than of its being defective. There is a sun, although the 
man born blind does not see it. 

If, then, the qualities of things, and their relations, 
modes of action, and results, are real, and bear evidence of 
design in the intelligent and moral Power which instituted 
and upholds them ; and if our intellect perceives the de- 
sign, and also forms rules of action from the perception of 
it : then we need only to train the sentiments of Veneration 
and Wonder to hallow these as rules revealed through 
Nature to our understandings by God, and they will become 
religious — and to train the sentiments of Benevolence and 
Conscientiousness to recognise them as embodying duties 
prescribed by God, and they will become moral ; and thus 
the laws of Nature will furnish us with a basis of religion 
and morality. 

I cannot over-state the importance of our keeping in 
view that all existing religions have been formed by asso- 
ciating intellectual ideas about God and His will (in some 
instances drawn from polluted sources) with the religious 
emotions ; and that there is no natural obstacle to our 
associating with these emotions the conceptions of Gocl 
and His will which we derive from the study of His works, 
and thus constituting a religion in harmony with our know- 
ledge of existing things and their relations. It is pre- 
sumable that such a religion would excite, gratify, cherish, 
and improve all the faculties of our mind. It would neces- 
sarily also embrace a code of systematic morality. 



134 



CHAPTER IX. 

Religious Discipline of Nature. 

Another advantage which would follow from acknow- 
ledging Nature to be sacred would be the introduction of 
an efficient religious discipline into life. Discipline consists 
in prescribing rules of action, and enforcing observance of 
them, by motives that strongly influence the will. The 
soldier, as I have said, affords a striking example of its 
efficacy. I knew a dirty, slovenly, ill-conditioned lad, who 
used to drive coal-carts, and who in a fit of drunkenness 
enlisted as a soldier. Three months afterwards I saw him 
again, and scarcely recognised his identity. He was then 
clean in person and attire, he walked erect, and his manner 
was decided, yet respectful. Discipline — in other words, 
commands strictly enforced, but accompanied by instruction 
how to obey them, and the example of obedience in others — 
had produced the change. In the case of the soldier, dis- 
cipline accomplishes much more than this. It renders the 
individual alert, obedient, resolute, and all-enduring in the 
discharge of his duties ; still the mainspring of its influence 
is command strictly enforced. 

Now, we have a discipline of this sort in Xature if we 
only open our minds to understand it. If we know the 
structure, functions, and laws of health, of the digestive 
and respiratory organs, we shall perceive that temperance, 
cleanliness, exercise, the breathing of pure air, and other 
observances, are prescribed to us by a command that is 
absolute in authority : that of God Himself, and enforced 
by a discipline that is irresistible. On the one hand, we 



CHAP, ix.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 135 

have health, enjoyment, efficiency, abundance, and length 
of days as the rewards of observance ; and, on the other, 
disease, pain, incapacity, mental misery, physical desti- 
tution, and premature death, as the consequences of dis- 
obedience. Every organ and faculty, bodily and mental, 
acts under similar conditions ; and a work which should 
elucidate each organ, in its structure, functions, and modes 
of action, and the natural and inevitable consequences of 
its use and abuse, would reveal a system of philosophy, 
morality, and practical wisdom, which might be indissolubly 
combined with religion ; for it would proceed from, and be 
enforced by, a discipline instituted by God. All these ad- 
vantages are lost by our obstinate refusal to regard Nature 
as sacred, and by the exclusion of her authority and teach- 
ing as practical rules from our literature, our schools, our 
pulpits, and our legislative assemblies, either ignorantly, 
or out of deference to the dogmas of a dark and semi- 
barbarous age. 

It is only by regarding Nature as an Institution and 
God as its Euler that religion can be successfully introduced 
as a sanctifying influence and an element of discipline into 
daily life ; and this is not only possible, but i3 so obviously 
practicable when earnestly and intelligently attempted, 
that only the misdirection of our faculties by the dogmas 
can account for its being so long neglected and resisted. 

I have been favoured with the perusal of the outlines 
of a series of lessons on Social Economy given privately 
by my friend Mr. William Ellis, of Lancaster Terrace, 
London, in which he has demonstrated that by the order 
of Nature every line of conduct — in the pursuit of wealth 
whether by farming, manufacturing, navigation, commerce, 
or by the practice of professions — in order to be successful 
must be moral ; and that success follows skill, industry, 
and morality, as failure follows ignorance, sloth, and im- 
morality, with the same certainty that a rich crop of corn 



13(3 SCIENCE AXD RELIGIOX. [chap. IX. 

follows from skilful ploughing, manuring, sowing, tending, 
and reaping. 

The dogmas, on the contrary, represent a state of war 
as existing between God and Mammon ; but Mr. Ellis 
shows that when this is understood to be a condemnation 
of the pursuit of wealth, it must be a mistake ; because, 
as the production of wealth is indispensable to human 
well-being, and also to the practice of morality and religion, 
there must be modes of pursuing it which are in harmony 
with morality and religion. Now, surveying in detail all 
trades and professions, and the specific acts by means of 
which their objects — namely, the acquisition of wealth, 
social distinction, power, influence, and other enjoyments — 
are most successfully attained, he shows that morality must 
pervade and form the basis of them all 

For example — The commercial maxim to buy in the 
cheapest and to sell in the dearest market is generally con- 
demned as breathing the concentrated spirit of selfishness, 
or Marmnonisni. But let us try this condemnation by the 
rules of reason and morality before we acquiesce in its 
justice. In Odessa, for instance, after a good harvest there 
is a superabundance of wheat, more than its inhabitants can 
consume ; in consequence of which its price is very low. In 
the same city, however, there is a scarcity of cotton, and 
woollen cloths, and cutlery, in consequence of which the 
prices of these necessaries of life are very high. The people 
of Odessa would feel greatly relieved if some benevolent 
person would bring them a supply of these articles, and 
would take in return a portion of their superabundant corn. 
But in Liverpool, in consequence of a bad harvest, there is 
a great scarcity of wheat ; while, owing to the untiring 
industry of Manchester, Leeds, and Sheffield, there is a 
.superabundance of woollens, calicoes, and broad cloths, 
which lie unsold, because the people are forced to lay out 
their money in large amounts in buying the scarce, and 



chap, ix.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 137 



therefore high-priced, corn. The people of these towns 
desire, above all things, that some kind friend would 
bring them wheat, and exchange it for these goods that 
are lumbering their warehouses. 

Now, a merchant who owns a ship and has abundance 
of capital, buys in Liverpool the manufactured articles 
at the prices at which their owners are anxious to sell 
them— they are cheap, because they are superabundant. 
He fills his ship with them, sends it to Odessa, sells them 
there at the price which the inhabitants offer to give for 
them, and with that money he buys the wheat with which 
they are encumbered, and pays them the price they ask : 
it is a low price, because they have more wheat than they 
can consume. The ship carries this cargo to Liverpool, 
and there it is eagerly purchased, because it lessens the 
scarcity of food : one of the greatest evils with which 
human beings can be afflicted. 

But on counting the results of these transactions, the 
merchant finds that he has gained a considerable addition 
to his capital. This stimulates him and others to repeat 
the same course of transactions. And what is the ultimate 
effect ] The inhabitants of Odessa are at length relieved 
of much of their superfluous wheat, to their great content- 
ment ; while the supply of the manufactured articles lias 
become abundant, also to their great advantage. Turning 
to England, again, what has ensued ] Wheat has been 
imported so largely that it has fallen in price, and the 
poor rejoice ; while hardware, woollens, and calicoes have 
been purchased, paid for, and exported to so great an 
extent that the warehouses are empty, prices have risen, 
and the manufacturers are again in full employment at 
remunerating prices. 

These results are all the direct consequences of Divine 
Institutions, which give differences of climates and products 
to different parts of the globe ; and the gains of the 



138 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. IX. 



merchant are the rewards furnished by Divine wisdom 
and goodness to those who intelligently, honestly, and 
diligently apply their knowledge, skill, and capital in 
removing the wants and increasing the enjoyments of 
their feliow-men. Viewed in this light, as the fulfilment 
of a Divine appointment, buying in the cheapest and 
selling in the dearest market passes from the dominion 
of Mammon into that of God, and becomes not merely 
a moral, but a religious act. 

Similar observations will be found to hold good in 
regard to all the other necessary acts and duties of life, 
whenever we shall consent to view this world as a Divine 
Institution, and turn our whole faculties to discover its 
laws, and to act conformably to them. It is from the 
pursuit of wealth by immoral means, and the application 
of it to immoral or useless purposes, that the evils 
erroneously ascribed to it arise. As, by the fiat of Nature, 
wealth is indispensable to human welfare, the sin even of 
the miser, who makes his property his god, consists not 
in accumulating and investing, but in something else. The 
wealth he has saved is so much capital gained to the 
society in which he lives, and when he invests it on good 
securities, he lends it to men of skill, enterprise, and 
industry, who apply it in still further augmenting the 
capital of their country, by which all are benefited ; for 
capital is an indispensable element in the production of 
the necessaries and comforts as well as the luxuries of life. 

The miser's sin lies in his neglect of all the personal, 
domestic, and social duties which are incumbent on him 
as the possessor of riches. It is by such conduct that he 
becomes the slave of Mammon and the contemner of God. 
The profligate spendthrift who dissipates an inherited 
fortune in immoral indulgences cannot be called a wor- 
shipper, but a contemner of Mammon, yet he is equally 
a contemner of God ; for, so far as lies in his power, he 



CHAP. IX.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 130 



wastes the products of the skill and industry of his more 
virtuous predecessors, deprives himself of the means of 
discharging his personal and social duties, and impedes 
the progress of his country by destroying the fund for 
promoting the industry and rewarding the skill and intelli- 
gence of his fellow-men.* 

Mr. Williams and I taught the laws of health and 
social economy on these principles in a school kept by 
him in Edinburgh for the children of the working classes ; 
and while we were calumniated by excellent evangelical 
persons as inculcators of infidelity, the more intelligent 
children understood, rejoiced in, and profited by the lessons ; 
and even the less gifted were interested, so that no blows 
or chastisements were needed : exclusion from the lessons 
was felt to be the severest punishment that could be 
inflicted. 

It has been objected to these views that they omit 
altogether the higher or spiritual life — the grand aspira- 
tions of the soul after eternity and universal knowledge, 
its longing after the everlasting progress of our spiritual 
being, its desire of a more intimate communion with God, 
and so forth. But what really is this higher life ? In 
St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome, I have seen the most 
ignorant of men and women kneeling before the images 
of the Virgin Mary and the saints, and in the outpouring 
of their devotional emotions towards them enjoying the 
higher life. It was unmistakably expressed in their eyes, 
features, and attitudes. I have observed the widow and 
the mother, broken down with sorrow for the loss of a 

* These principles are successfully expounded in several Works on 
1 ''Social Economy" by Mr. William Ellis, published by Smith, 
Elder & Co., of London. The latest is entitled, "Where must we 
Look for the further Prevention of Crime p " and is both interesting 
and instructive. 1857. 



140 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. IX. 



beloved husband or child, there unburden their souls of 
grief, and depart relieved and comforted. 

I have seen a Swedenborgian congregation in possession 
of the higher life as the religious emotions soared through 
their spiritual world, while they drew joy and hope, peace 
and consolation, from the communications which they 
thence received. The congregation of Shaking Quakers, 
before described, were seen rising into ecstasies, and almost 
sinking into convulsions, under the influence of their higher 
life, elicited by their chants, their songs, and their dances. 
I have listened to the Calvinist describing his higher life, 
unfolding its glories, its consolations, its inspiring hopes, 
and its strengthening grace, all elicited by his contem- 
plation of the length and breadth, the height and depth 
of the love of Christ in giving Himself up as a Sacrifice 
for sin. I have heard the Unitarian pour forth his vivid 
experience of the higher life, founded on his deep appre- 
hension of the all-embracing benevolence, wisdom, and 
justice of God, on his perceptions of God's overflowing- 
love, pervading all beings, time, and space. And were we 
to visit Turkey, Persia, and Hindostan, there also should 
we find thousands of ardent worshippers, each in the blaze 
of enjoyment of his own higher life. 

Now, what is the true meaning and explanation of these 
phenomena? One circumstance characterises them all — 
the organs of Veneration, Wonder, and Hope are intensely 
active, although directed differently in each devotee. The 
emotions and the pleasure accompanying their activity are 
natural, and constitute the higher life ; but their direction 
to particular objects is accidental, and depends on what 
they have been trained to venerate. 

It thus appears that it is not the absolute truth of 
religion — i.e., its truth in the sight of God — that gives it the 
power of producing in believers what is called the higher 
life, with all the hopes, joys, consolations, and feelings of 



chap. IX.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 141 



resignation and endurance which accompany it ; but that 
these depend primarily on the force with which the faith 
stimulates the religious faculties of the devotee. To do 
this effectually, the faith and ritual used as exciting instru- 
ments must be in harmony with, or at least not violently 
in contradiction to, the state of enlightenment of his other 
faculties. Hence, the lower the moral and intellectual de- 
velopment and instruction of the worshipper, the further 
may his creed and ritual deviate from reason, and from the 
dictates of benevolence and justice, without impairing their 
emotional influence on him. 

But conversely, the more powerful the intellect, and the 
higher its instruction, and the more extensive and beneficial 
the sphere in which the moral faculties have been trained 
to act in any individual, the more pure, rational, beneficent, 
and self-consistent must a creed and ritual become before 
they will be capable of satisfying the demands of his 
faculties, and of eliciting in him that fervid action of the 
religious emotions which constitutes the higher life. 

If the view be correct that man cannot comprehend the 
nature and mode of being of God, because the finite cannot 
comprehend the Infinite, it follows that the only rational 
conception we can form of the Divine Being consists of a 
concentration and personification by our own minds in 
Him of all the power, wisdom, and goodness discernible in 
Nature ; and if so, then the more we know of the manifesta- 
tions of these qualities, the higher must our conceptions of 
the attributes of that Being become. And if the " highest " 
life consists in the highest exercise and condition of our 
faculties, it follows that, in proportion to the enlargement 
of our knowledge, we shall augment the means of vivifying 
our emotional faculties, and of bringing them into harmony 
with the Institutions of God, and shall thereby approach 
the highest point of improvement permitted to man. 

It is often stated as a reproach to science that it makes 



142 



SCIEXCE AXD RELIGION. [chap. is. 



men infidels. The real fact is, that by carrying their 
intellectual and moral faculties to a higher state of develop- 
ment and cultivation, by giving them larger and truer 
views of God and His works, it renders the creeds and 
rituals of a less enlightened age, with their barbarous 
dogmas and conflicting propositions, repugnant to their 
minds, and incapable of exciting and satisfying their 
religious emotions. The greater the number of other 
faculties in addition to the religious which any faith and 
worship are able to excite and satisfy, the greater will be 
their influence over practical conduct ; and their power 
of leading to beneficial results will diminish, and will 
ultimately cease, in proportion to the extent to which they 
become isolated from the other powers. 

This will hold good whether the discrepancy between 
the faith and ritual and the other faculties arises from the 
improvement or from the degradation of the latter. The 
creeds of the sixteenth century do not now exercise the 
same influence over men's minds which they did when, 
through a corresponding ignorance and barbarism, the 
whole faculties were in harmony with them. 

The longing after the Infinite, which is at present 
regarded by many persons as the grand foundation of 
religious life, when traced to its source, does not appear to 
merit this distinction. Each propensity and sentiment, 
from producing a mere desire or emotion, is constitutionally 
indefinite in its longings and aspirations. It needs the 
intellect to limit and guide it. If we ask the most 
exalted devotees of every religion and of every sect to 
define their higher life, and if we analyse their definition, 
we shall find that indulgence in boundless aspirations 
proceeding from the religious emotions constitutes its 
essential element. 

The higher emotional faculties are the sources not only 
of religious devotion, but of the purest morality and the 



CHAP, ix.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 143 

sublimest poetry. In the present state of human know- 
ledge, however, when the moral, religious, and political 
opinions of most men rest on a confused basis of the 
natural, founded on experience, and of the supernatural, 
drawn from Scripture, the preacher, author, poet, orator, 
and political agitator, who is capable of strongly exciting 
not them chiefly, but the lower propensities also, wields 
a stupendous power over his fellow-men. The emotions 
yield to his passionate and thrilling calls ; intellect stands 
aside ; and his hearers glow with his fervour, give up their 
souls to his impulsive guidance, and embrace his proposi- 
tions. But because the means of attaining the real, per- 
manent, and only desirable gratification of the emotional 
faculties are fixed and regulated by a power which does 
not yield to human impulses ; and because these means can 
be discovered and employed only by the intellect enlightened 
by observation and experience ; the schemes of even the 
most eloquent orators, whenever they partake of the vague- 
ness of the emotional faculties, or are based on erroneous or 
imperfect views of the natural means of achieving good, 
fail, and end in disappointment. 

What, then, should constitute the higher life in natural 
religion ? The answer is — vivid action of the religious 
emotions, combined with that of the moral sentiments and 
of the intellect, enlightened by the highest attainable know- 
ledge of God's will manifested in Nature, and all directed 
to the attainment of a pure, holy, and beneficent state 
of being. The ecstatic delights of fervid devotion and 
undoubting faith ; hope, joy, and resignation ; consolation 
in affliction, and strength to endure and persevere in the dark 
hours of life, may all be drawn from these sources at least 
as copiously and as certainly as from the fountains from 
which, in many countries, they are now sought to be derived. 
According to this system, God's institutions are the basis 
of our judgments, and His will is the rule and standard of 



144 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. is. 



our actions. The framework of our bodies and the endow- 
ments of our minds are ascribed to Him. Every relation in 
which we stand is viewed as of His appointment. In the 
language of Scripture, therefore, "Whether we eat or drink, 
or whatsoever we do, we do all to the glory of God," when 
we apply every function of mind and body to its legitimate 
uses, from deference to His will, as well as from the con- 
viction that by this means alone can we reach our own 
happiness. 

In reference to personal and social improvement, religion 
severed from the laws of Nature stands in the same predica- 
ment as pure mathematics do when they are unapplied to 
practical objects. Ask the profoundest mathematician who 
had never studied navigation or served on board a ship to 
steer a vessel to China, and his mathematics would be 
perfectly inadequate to enable him to execute the task. To 
his abstract science he must add a practical knowledge of 
ships, and of the mode of applying mathematics to direct 
their course at sea. Ask a pure mathematician to construct 
a railroad or a steam-driven spinning mill, and he would be 
equally helpless ; because his science needs to be embodied 
in practical forms before it can become useful. In like 
manner, religion — which, in itself, is a sentiment or emotion 
— must condescend to borrow aid from Nature before it can 
accomplish any practical earthly purpose whatever. All 
personal and social improvements have been made by the 
Ruler of this world to depend on physical and physiological 
conditions. Health and life depend on them, wealth and 
destitution depend on them, mental vigour, even the ability 
to pray, depends on them ; and when the brain is incapable 
of action the religious emotions vanish. I repeat, therefore, 
that before religion can accomplish its highest objects — the 
glory of God and the well-being of man— it must include 
an embodiment of the will of the Infinite, as manifested in 
His institutions. 



chap, ix.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 145 



Tracing the condition of the religious emotions through 
the savage, the barbarous, and the modern stages of society, 
we perceive that the higher the enlightenment of the 
intellect, and the more perfect the cultivation of the moral 
sentiments, the more pure and beneficent has religion 
become, and the more effectually has it operated on the 
minds of its votaries as a stimulus to social improvement. 
The same results will probably distinguish its future course. 
The present prevalent creeds of Europe appear to be at war 
with its science, and in consequence to be retarding its 
progress. Religion is employed as the instrument of 
priests and sovereigns to maintain themselves in authority 
and to repress the moral and intellectual life of nations. 

The Christian religion, however, possesses one great 
advantage. It stands apart from all personal and social 
secular action. The Jewish, Hindu, and Mahommedan 
faiths have elevated certain personal acts, such as ablutions, 
eating particular kinds of food prepared according to pre- 
scribed rules, abstinence from marriage out of the pale of 
the creed, separation of society into sacred and secular 
orders or castes, and other regulations, into substantial 
elements of their religions. These practices and usages 
form part and parcel of their duty to God or Vishnu ; and 
whenever they are at variance with the order of Nature, 
they present almost insurmountable obstacles to the social 
improvement of the people. The Christian religion em- 
bodies no similar observances as constituent elements of its 
Divine service, but announces certain moral and religious 
principles to guide personal conduct and social action ; and 
it thus leaves the path open to reason and science to 
discover and unfold the order of the Divine government in 
Nature. It will be the duty of all who sincerely desire to 
maintain its influence to show that it contains principles 
which, if rightly interpreted, will combine gracefully with 
the religious precepts revealed in Xature. 
K 



146 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. IX. 



But, practically, this freedom is attended with some 
disadvantages. Ambitious men seek to found social dis- 
tinctions on adherence to particular dogmatic interpretations 
of Scripture, whence arise dominant and endowed churches, 
and dissenting associations of gigantic magnitude and 
influence. All of these agree in treating the Divine 
precepts revealed for human guidance in Nature as destitute 
of a religious character, while they invest their own con- 
flicting tenets with this sanction. Thus fortified, the 
leaders of the sects convert their associations into instru- 
ments of power. They first bring the minds of their 
adherents into a state of subjection to their dogmas and 
forms of Church, government and worship, and then they 
employ them as instruments to maintain the conflicts 
which each sect wages with its rivals. These conflicts of 
clerical leaders for power distract the public mind, and 
obstruct many enlightened measures of improvement. 

It seems incredible, however, that when the religious 
emotions, freed from the trammels of barbarous ages, shall 
in future centuries ally themselves with the knowledge and 
morality of an advanced civilisation, a richer harvest of 
individual enjoyment and social happiness shall not be 
reaped from their action. 

Mr. John Stuart Mill, in the Sixth Book of his Logic, 
states, in his own language, that our desires of improvement 
proceed from the propensities and sentiments, but that 
these give mere desires, and cannot tell us how to satisfy 
them. This depends on knowledge, and knowledge on 
intellect. The intellectual state of any nation is, therefore, 
says he, the best index of its real civilisation ; and in the 
history of the w T orld, every great intellectual discovery was 
the precursor, and the indispensable precursor, of a great 
stride in material civilisation. " Every considerable 
change, historically known to us, in the condition of 
any portion of mankind," continues Mr. Mill, "has been 



chap. IX.] RELIGIOUS DISCIPLINE OF NATURE. 147 

preceded by a change of proportional extent in the state of 
their knowledge, or in their prevalent beliefs. From this 
accumulated evidence we are justified in concluding that 
the order of human progression in all respects will be a 
corollary deducible from the order of progression in the 
intellectual convictions of mankind : that is, from the law of 
the successive transformations of religion and science." # 
These remarks are equally profound and true. 

* The views entertained by eminent divines on the authority of tho 
law of Nature in reference to morals and religion have been collected 
and published in a learned and instructive work by Eobert Cox, 
entitled ' ' Sabbath Laws and Sabbath Duties considered in Relation 
to their Natural and Scriptural Grounds," &c. (Edinburgh, 1853), 
pages 202-7, to which I beg leave to refer. 



K2 



148 



CHAPTER X. 

The Bondage of Dogma. 

The bearing on Christianity of the views of the Divine 
government before stated is an important consideration; 
but I do not enter into it in detail, because Christians are 
divided into so many different sects, each of which main- 
tains that its own views constitute the true religion of 
Jesus Christ, while it denounces those entertained by other 
sects as " soul-destroying errors," that it is difficult for a 
layman to select a view of it which will not be widely 
disputed. The evangelical Protestants, for example, often 
apply these words to the Roman Catholic faith ; while at 
the same time they denounce Unitarians as infidels. 

Their own doctrines, on the other hand, are described by 
some of their opponents in terms not less reproachful. By 
John Wesley, for example, the doctrine of election is de- 
scribed in the following words : — "The sum of all this is : 
One in twenty (suppose) of mankind are elected, nineteen in 
twenty are reprobated ! The elect shall be saved, do what 
they will; the reprobate shall be damned, do what they can. 
This is the doctrine of Calvinism, for which Diabolism 
would be a better name, and in the worst and bloodiest 
idolatry that ever defiled the earth there is nothing so 
horrid, so monstrous, so impious as this.' 5 # (Southey's 
"Life of Wesley," 3rd edit., Vol. I., p. 321.) 

* See other striking examples of the "way in which the adherents of 
the different sects speak of each other's views of Christian doctrine, in 
Mr. Cox's " Sabbath Laws and Sabbath Duties," before referred to, 
pp. 54, 55, 127-9. 



chap, x.] THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 140 



If a majority is entitled to decide, then the Roman 
Catholic faith has the best claim to be considered as the 
true exposition of the religion of the New Testament ; but 
in religious questions we cannot admit numbers as decisive 
of truth. 

I confine myself, therefore, to the dogmas taught in the 
standards of the prevailing Churches of Christendom, and 
I use the expression "doctrinal interpretations" because 
nearly all that passes in the world for Christian faith really 
consists of systems of doctrine founded upon particular texts, 
interpreted in a particular manner by particular individuals 
or conclaves of men ; and, in point of fact, the Bible contains 
no systematic exposition of religious doctrine which all men 
must necessarily acknowledge as Divine revelation. It is 
chiefly as expounded in catechisms and creeds that the 
Christian religion is now practically operating on social well- 
being ; yet if a dozen men, possessed of the highest order of 
mind, and thoroughly instructed in the ancient languages 
and in the modern sciences, were to read the Bible without 
previous bias, and were they commissioned to produce an 
authoritative interpretation of it, I doubt very much if they 
w 7 ould present to the world & facsimile of any existing creed 
or articles of faith. 

Miss Joanna Baillie, in her "View of the General Tenor 
of the New Testament regarding the Nature and Dignity of 
Jesus Christ,"* remarks that the three leading systems of 
doctrine on this subject "stand far and far apart." If, 
besides these, there are very many minor doctrinal interpre- 
tations of Scripture embraced by large and intelligent bodies 
of men, it is clear that none of these can, on the ground of 
their perfect infallibility, be logically accepted as Divine 
revelation, calculated to guide the faith and practice of all 
mankind in reference to time and eternity. Instead of 



* Longman & Co. 1S31, 



i:o 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[CHAP. X. 



progress being made towards unity of belief, the process 
is the reverse. 

During the last fifteen years, I have resided for periods 
of greater or less duration in the United States of America, 
in Germany and Italy, have visited France, and been a good 
deal in England ; and from the nature of my published 
works, I have been brought into familiar and confidential 
communication with many able and highly instructed in- 
dividuals of all faiths and sects ; and my conclusion is, that 
Christianity, as taught in the prevailing creeds, is already 
undermined in the convictions of very many men and women 
of great capacity and attainments, and unexceptionable 
moral character. Archbishop Whately remarks that, 
"Force, together with fraud, the two great engines for the 
support of the Papal dominion, have almost annihilated 
sincere belief in Christianity among the educated classes 
throughout a great portion of Europe." 

According to my observation, the obstinate and arrogant 
adherence of the clergy to Protestant articles of faith, at 
variance with the science of the age, has to some extent 
produced a similar effect in countries that are not Roman 
Catholic. Indeed, I have found that even where belief in 
some form of doctrine is still professed, the greatest liberties 
are often taken with it, one individual rejecting one point of 
faith, and another another ; so much so, that had I written 
down the views of some dozens of professed believers, and 
published them, they would have presented a spectacle of 
extraordinary conflict and inconsistency. 

This statement, I am convinced, will be confirmed by 
most persons who have enjoyed similar means of observation 
both at home and abroad. Those, on the other hand, who 
travel wrapped up in an impenetrable conviction of the 
infallibility of their own opinions will rarely find other men 
inclined to disclose to them their true sentiments on 
religious subjects. 



CHAI\ X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



151 



There are, indeed, liberal sects, and many high-minded 
individuals, who reject the extreme doctrines of Church 
standards, and see in Christianity only a religion of love to 
God and goodwill to man, and who regard its Founder as a 
sublime Instructor, teaching us by precept and example how 
to live and how to die. To their views of Christianity my 
objections do not apply. But these sects and individuals 
are still so few in number, and so feeble in social influence, 
and many of them so deficient in courage to proclaim their 
convictions, and to support them by open and active efforts, 
that practically their interpretations of Christianity exert 
little influence on society. 

The views embodied in the standards of the predomi- 
nant Churches appear to me to be now acting as great 
obstacles to social progress and civilisation. The grand 
principles there represented are all supernatural ; and the 
revelations of the Divine will inXature, as a basis of morals 
and religion, are excluded from schools, colleges, churches, 
and social consideration ; and thus these interpretations are 
chaining up the moral, intellectual, and religious faculties of 
many superior minds. The earnestly religious are truly the 
salt of the earth ; their aspirations are high, their motives 
pure, and the objects at which they aim transcenclently im- 
portant. It is grievous, therefore, to see so many of them 
trammelled by the fetters of narrow sectarian creeds wasting 
their lives and their substance in wars with each other ; 
opposing now one alleged error of doctrine or form, and now 
another ; clearly observing the mote in their neighbours 
eye, but never discerning the beam in their own ; while 
God's fair world of mind and matter lies before them, in- 
viting in vain their highest efforts to improve it, and to 
render it a scene of greater goodness, more fervent piety, 
and purer happiness than it now exhibits. 

The Divine laws of religion, morality, and practical con- 
duct revealed in Nature are nearly banished from the pulpit, 



152 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. x. 



and few attempts are made to harmonise them with 
Christianity. In England, disquisitions about the real 
presence, prevenient grace, the efficacy of baptism, the 
communication of the Holy Spirit by ordination, and so 
forth, usurp the place of God's revelations in Nature ; while 
in Scotland the dogmas cited above* are made to play a 
similar part. 

The prevailing dogmas rest on the Fall of man as their 
basis. The religion of Nature appears to contradict this 
assumption ; for if the human constitution, bodily and 
mental, has been adapted to external Nature such as it now 
exists, and Nature to it, then apparently man never was 
essentially different from what he now is. 

The next dogma is that the Fall brought sin into the 
world, and all its woes ; and that the Second Person of the 
Trinity, Himself God, assumed the form of man, suffered the 
penalty of that sin, atoned for it, and thereby restored the 
human race to the favour of God. And as a corollary, it is 
said that it is only through faith in that atonement, and 
through the influence of the Holy Spirit, that the moral 
taint introduced into man's nature by the Fall can be re- 
moved, and that the punishment due for it and for each 
individual's actual transgressions can be averted. 

The doctrines of the Fall and the Atonement are rejected 
by some sects as unsupported by sound interpretation of 
Scripture ; and they are entertained by other sects and 
individuals under various modifications. Into these ques- 
tions it is not my province to enter, and, therefore, I confine 
myself to observing that, according to the views before ex- 
pounded, moral evil arises from abuse of our bodily and 
mental functions, and the natural mode of averting it is 
to give to all the organs of body and mind the best 
possible constitution and a proportionate development, 
and then, by instruction in the laws to which God has 

* Pages 107-110. 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



153 



subjected them, and which are real indications of His will 
In regard to their uses, to direct the whole to their highest 
objects. 

If this be the true view of man's nature and relations, 
the dogmas must be tried by this new standard, and the 
remedies proposed by them for human evils must be re- 
considered in reference to this exposition of their causes. 
Modern science and the physiological constitution of man, 
and the consequences which flow from them, were un- 
doubtedly unknown to the earnest, but ignorant, men who 
compiled the dogmas from Scripture. 

Lastly, the dogmas represent the Gospel to have brought 
"life and immortality to light,'' and to teach the resurrec- 
tion of the body from the dead, a Divine judgment, and the 
final consignment of all human beings either to heaven or 
to hell — that is, to an eternity of happiness or of misery — 
according to their good or their bad conduct in this world, 
or, as is the doctrine of many sects, according to their 
having believed soundly or unsoundly in points of faith, or 
even according to an eternal decree consigning them to the 
one or to the other of these destinations, passed on them 
before they came into existence. 

Those doctrines lie beyond the limits of science ; and I 
shall, therefore, confine my remarks to what appear to me 
to be serious abuses of them. In regard to heaven : It is 
generally allotted to the true believer, who shows the 
soundness of his faith by his good works ; but some sects 
maintain that faith alone suffices to ensure salvation. Xow, 
the capacity of an individual to believe anything, and to do 
any works, depends on the development and condition of his 
mind, and on the training and instruction he has received. 
The higher his moral and physiological endowments, the 
better is he qualified to believe and to act rightly ; and the 
lower, the less so. These conditions are determined chiefly 
for the individual, and little by him. Moreover, by the 



154 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. X. 



order of God's moral government, as before explained, 
highly-endowed individuals have the fewest temptations to 
resist, and the fewest straggles to maintain, in this life ; 
and, as a general rule, they enjoy the greatest share of happi- 
ness allotted to humanity. These are great and precious 
boons conferred on them by their bountiful Father ; but the 
best use which they can make of such gifts appears to me to 
give them no claim to heaven — their trust for it should rest 
exclusively on the will of God. 

Further, they are called on, by their gifts, to use all the 
means in their power to raise themselves and their less- 
favoured brethren higher in the scale of improvement, by 
seeking truth, abandoning error, and removing personal and 
social evils, and by endeavouring in all things to conform to 
the Divine laws. Instead of doing so, many highly endowed 
persons teach only catechisms and dogmas in schools and 
from the pulpit, and too generally leave the people the 
prey of bad habits, foul air, intemperance, and destitution, 
without instructing them how to make adequate efforts to 
remove the natural causes of these evils. 

Xo spectacle is more common than to see an unhappy 
individual, after a life of immorality, which society regards 
as so flagrant that his existence can no longer be tolerated 
on earth, assured by his spiritual guides that his repentance 
in prison, accompanied by unhesitating faith in the atone- 
ment of Jesus Christ, will prove sufficient to transmit his 
soul from the gallows to heaven, where he will enjoy 
through eternity the society of God, angels, and just men 
made perfect. The felon who thoroughly believes this, 
declares— apparently with good reason — that the day of his 
ignominious death is the happiest of his life ; but surely 
this is an abuse of the Scripture doctrine. 

In reference to hell : It is generally assigned to un- 
believers, to misbelievers, and to evil-doers. But erroneous 
belief and evil deeds arise chiefly from a deficient develop- 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



155 



ment, or an unfavourable constitution, of the moral faculty, 
or from these combined with deficient training and instruc- 
tion. These evils are generally inherited, and not volun- 
tarily selected by individuals. According to this view, the 
tendency to vice, crime, and sin appears to be a misfortune, 
and the remedy for it seems to be removal of its natural 
causes. To consign individuals thus constituted, and thus 
placed, to eternal misery for conduct which is mainly the 
natural result of their faculties and circumstances, ap- 
pears at variance with benevolence and justice; while, to 
assure them of heaven as the result of a prison-inspired 
repentance and belief, seems to be equally opposed to all 
sound views of a moral government of the world here or 
hereafter. 

The abuses of the doctrine of heaven and hell* appear to 
me to be subversive of all efficacious discipline of the human 
mind. For example : A banker passes a long period of his 
life in genteel society, making great professions of evangeli- 
cal religion, and abounding with prayers. At length he is 
discovered to have been all the while robbing his customers 
feloniously selling their securities, and applying the price to 
his own uses. By this conduct, he plunges many honest and 
industrious families into irretrievable ruin, and casts a deep 
shade of suffering over their remaining days. Under the 
dogmas, the sufferers, in their ire, thank God that there is a 
day of future judgment and final retribution, in which cant- 
ing hypocritical scoundrels, who make a cloak of religion to 
cover their crimes, and who embitter the lives of the honest 
and the good, will receive their reward in condemnation to 
eternal misery. The prospect of future punishment is thus 
believed to exercise a grand protecting influence to save 
society from such catastrophes. 

But let us turn to the prison cell. There the condemned 



* See Appendix No. I., " Heaven and Hell." 



156 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. x. 



felon finds consolation in the dogmas which teach that 
" the human heart is deceitful above all things, and 
desperately wicked " ; and that he has been left to feel the 
truth of this representation, and to act it out in deeds, in 
order to subdue his obdurate heart and to bring him into a 
state of grace. Thanks to the mercy of God, he now looks 
" to the Rock that is higher than I" ; believes in the atone- 
ment ; finds all his iniquities forgiven ; the gates of heaven 
thrown open to him ; and the angels singing songs of joy 
over the great sinner who has repented ! 

The dogmas, when thus applied, be it observed, not only 
lead to these inconsistent consequences, but blind men's 
understandings to the real order of the Divine government 
on earth. I venture to say. after forty years' observation 
and experience, that the development of the moral and intel- 
lectual organs in individuals who are not insane, affords an 
indication of their natural strength of virtuous resolution, 
or of their natural proclivity to dishonesty : and that 
while society spurns and neglects this great fact in the 
Divine government of the world, these substitutes for it 
are feeble as gossamer webs to protect us against the 
crimes of ill-constituted minds placed in unfavourable 
circumstances. 

On the other hand, such individuals themselves, if placed 
in favourable situations in which scope is afforded for all 
the talents and moral qualities they possess, and in which 
no strain, in the form of temptation or opportunity, is 
applied to overpower their weaker faculties, would find 
this discipline more effective than that now applied. It 
would leave them at liberty, in ignorance of their own 
deficiencies, and amidst severe temptations, to follow the 
dictates of their own ill-balanced desires ; restrained only 
by the criminal law on earth, and by the prospect of a final 
judgment in the world to come. The former they hope 
by dexterity to evade ; while they are taught that a 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



157 



condemnatory sentence in the latter may at all times be 
avoided by means of repentance and faith. 

But the abuses of this doctrine reach their acme in 
obstructing the social improvement of man. In almost all 
the kingdoms of Christendom the governments have allied 
themselves with the priesthood to prevent the people from 
pursuing their own happiness by the development and free 
exercise of their mental faculties. The government of the 
Pope is highly injurious to his subjects. (1857.) He ex- 
cludes the study of natural science, and of all moral, 
religious, and political subjects that might by any possibility 
conflict with the dogmas of which he is the fountain, or 
might teach his people to scrutinise the uses he makes of 
his temporal and spiritual power. 

He places books suspected of such tendencies on his 
Index Expurgatorius, and he prohibits his people, under the 
peril of future condemnation, and also of temporal punish- 
ment, from reading them. It is the belief in the mass of 
his subjects that he and his Church actually hold the keys 
of heaven and hell, that gives him his tremendous power ; 
while it is the consciousness on his part that the knowledge 
of the real order of God's government on earth, if attained 
by his people, would blow his dogmas to the winds, and hurl 
him from his throne, that prompts him to repel this in- 
formation as his most formidable enemy. The temporal 
interests of the subjects of the Pope are sacrificed with the 
most unhesitating alacrity to the interests of his spiritual 
authority, and a degree of physical and moral degradation 
reigns in his territories unexampled in the worst parts of 
Europe. 

Next to the Pope stands the King of Naples, who rules 
on the same principles, and with the same results. Austria 
follows a similar course. Her Emperor has recently con- 
cluded a concordat with the Pope, the object of which is 
to place all moral and religious training and social action 



15S 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. X. 



under the trammels of the priesthood of that country. 
They are the tools of the secular government, which again 
seeks to maintain its own power and permanency by 
using them as instruments for suppressing moral and 
intellectual enlightenment, and free thought and action 
in the people. 

Nor is this abuse of spiritual power confined to Roman 
Catholic sovereigns. The King of Prussia is labouring to 
circumscribe the illuminating and improving influence of 
the public schools of his kingdom, established by his more 
enlightened predecessors, because their tendency has been 
to foster the desire for political freedom and social improve- 
ment. He is doing all that lies in his power to diminish 
the amount of instruction in natural science in the schools, 
and to augment belief in the dogmas of the Calvinist sect, 
there called " Pietism." # 

The clergy of our own country may be divided into 
two classes — men of high m :ral 3 religious, and intellectual 

* [Since this passage was written the Pope has been deprived of 
his temporal power ; the progress of public opinion has materially 
modified the policy of the Emperor of Austria ; and political neces- 
sities have compelled Prince Bismarck to exercise a counteracting 
influence on the pietistic tendencies of the King of Prussia, now 
Emperor of Germany. As yet, it is impossible to say to what extent 
the consolidation and independence of Italy, and the political changes 
brought about by the Prussian and Austrian, and Prussian and French 
wars, will lead to an improvement in the education and training of the 
people, and to their greater civil and religious freedom. History 
shows too clearly how difficult it is to uproot long-established forms of 
thought, to permit us to indulge very strongly in the hope that sudden 
improvement will be effected. The aristocratic element is too power- 
ful in Germany to warrant us in believing that the old rulers will 
part with their power without a struggle ; and the people, both there 
and in the greater portion of the rest of Europe, are still unfit to 
be trusted with the control of their own destinies. Everything will 
depend upon the direction now given to education. — Ed.] 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



159 



endowments, imbued with the pure and benign spirit of 
Christianity, who preach it from the pulpit, and exhibit it 
in their lives— and persons who have chosen the clerical 
profession from inferior motives, and who never rise to a 
full comprehension and experience of the sources and nature 
of its vital power. These latter take Catechisms, Con- 
fessions, and Liturgies for their rules of faith, preach the 
letter of them, and employ them as ladders of ambition, or 
as engines of war with which to assail other sects. 

It is of this class that I here write. Many of them are 
the determined opponents of the introduction of science into 
schools, while they maintain that the Catechism and other 
expositions of the dogmas form the only safe basis for 
education. It is their influence that prevents the legislature 
from giving pecuniary assistance to schools in which the 
order of Nature is taught as a revelation of the will of God 
to man in regard to his terrestrial conduct. It is they who 
lead the people's religious emotions away from the recogni- 
tion of Nature as sacred, and of its Divine laws as worthy 
of reverence. They, too, have their Index Expurgatoriiis, 
their list of dangerous books, not to be read without peril to 
the soul and displeasure from the pastor. Their object 
is the same as that of the Pope, the Emperor, and the 
King — to retain the people in subjection to the spiritual 
power of which they are the depositaries on earth : and 
it is the promise of heaven and the threat of hell that 
enables them to succeed in these unholy and most injurious 
schemes. 

The countries in which political freedom shows its most 
benign influences are those in which the government rests 
on the power of the people, and in which the administrators 
are purely secular. England, Switzerland, and the United 
States of America are examples in point. 

Most English Protestant readers will acknowledge the 
evils here described to be true results of Papal ascendency ; 



160 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. X. 



but I beg to remark that the Pope, Emperors, and King?, 
and all their clergy, who thus abuse religion, hold the Bible 
in their hands all the while that they are thus perverting it. 
The Bible, therefore, when unsupported by knowledge of 
the laws of God's government on earth, has not proved 
sufficient to conduct even - educated and talented men to 
a sincere practice of its principles. They have so interpreted 
it as to convert it — by the prospects which it holds forth of 
future rewards and punishments not exclusively for good 
and bad actions, but for belief: belief in their dogmas and in 
their infallibility, or superior wisdom, as guides to heaven 
— into a tremendous instrument for degrading the people 
and obstructing their social improvement. 

It appears to me, therefore, in vain for man, after 
eighteen hundred years' experience of the insufficiency of 
the Bible to protect itself from abuse, when unaided by 
knowledge of the order of God's providence in Nature, to 
hope to prevent it from being turned into an instrument for 
gratifying the lust of power, to the injury of the world. 
Something obviously is wanted to render it incapable of 
being thus misapplied ; and it is worthy of consideration 
whether an interpretation of it in harmony with Nature 
may have this effect. 

The way in which the dogmas act in supporting des- 
potism is not generally understood. By excluding secular 
knowledge, they render men timid, and as incapable as 
children. 

Tyranny, for example, is the direct result of a low moral 
and intellectual condition of the people. A kingly tyrant 
has the strength only of one man, and cannot imprison and 
torture his liberal subjects by his personal strength. He 
is served by ministers whose moral condition is so low that 
they voluntarily lend him their aid in wickedness for the 
sake of honours and pay. They, however, do not personally 
execute his decrees. They find police-officers whose morality 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BOXDAGE OF DOGMA. 



101 



is sucli that, for pay, they voluntarily arrest, imprison, 
chain, and degrade whomsoever the king and his cabinet 
desire them so to treat. Even these men are not sufficient 
to do these disgraceful deeds with their unaided strength. 
Officers and soldiers are so destitute of patriotism, and of 
all high principle, that they lend them the aid of their 
physical force and discipline to support and protect them in 
the exercise of their odious vocation. The kingly power 
thus obviously rests on the low moral condition of the 
subjects. 

Why cannot Queen Victoria order a subject to be im- 
prisoned and chained ? Because the moral and intellectual 
condition of her people is such, that even if she had the 
inclination (which we know is the reverse of the fact), her 
subjects would not lend her their moral and physical power 
to gratify malignant propensities. Xo officer of the law 
would voluntarily execute her warrant without the signature 
of a Secretary of State ; and no Secretary would, to gratify 
her, encounter a fearful storm of public indignation and 
resistance, and risk his neck on impeachment, by subscribing 
such a document— hence tyranny, like that recently ascribed 
to the King of Xaples, is morally impossible in England. 
But the reason it is so, lies in the moral and intellectual 
condition of the people. 

The United States of America and Switzerland afford 
similar examples. Let the President of the one, or the 
Federal Chief Officer of the other, issue warrants of his 
own authority to apprehend, and, without trial, to imprison, 
chain, and torture any citizen of these countries for political 
offences, and let him [even find a Secretary of State to 
countersign them, the moral energy of the people would 
hurl both tyrants and secretaries to destruction. 

The Divine law, therefore, is, that social well-being shall 
be the direct result of widespread individual intelligence, 
morality, and religion reduced to practice. The dogmas, by 

L 



162 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. x. 



holding out heaven as the reward to despots for maintain- 
ing the true faith, and through it, social order; and by 
giving the people the solace of revenge in their sufferings, 
by the thought that there is a day of future retribution 
awaiting their oppressors : distract the minds of both parties 
from perceiving the fundamental truths that knowledge of, 
and conformity to, God's laws in Nature, afford the only- 
secure basis for individual and social prosperity ; that these 
laws are moral, and may be rendered religious by training ; 
and that, if honestly acted on, they will conduct both kings 
and subjects to the highest state of improvement attainable 
on earth. 

Nature, however, will proceed in her course whether we 
ignore, or study and reverence her ways. The only dif- 
ference will be in our course of action. If we regard the 
principles advocated in this Work as having any pretensions 
to truth, we shall reform our religious creeds, our criminal 
laws, and our treatment of all individuals who labour under 
moral deficiency ; and apply the true principles of the moral 
government of the world to the regulation of individual and 
social conduct. If we regard them as false, we shall adhere 
to our present opinions and line of action. In religion we 
shall continue to view the order of God's providence in 
relation to mankind in general in the light in which it is 
represented in the dogmas, and which continues to be 
earnestly inculcated by men of great talent and in- 
fluence. 

Of this, the following extract from an exposition of "The 
Book of Genesis," by Dr. Cancllish, is an example. He has 
been speaking of the fate of Sodom, and, referring to Luke 
xvii. 28-30, he continues : — 

"What will all their vain expedients for dissipating 
thought and pacifying conscience avail the unjust then ? 
They have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton ; 
they have nourished their hearts as in a day of slaughter. 



CHAP. X.] 



THE BONDAGE OF DOGMA. 



1G3 



They have been reserved unto that day ; shut up, so that 
none could escape. 

" Thus viewed, what a spectacle does the world, lying in 
wickedness, present ! A pen in which sheep are making 
themselves fat for slaughter ; a place of confinement ; a 
condemned cell, in which sentenced prisoners are shut up, 
sinners held fast in the hands of an angry God ! 

"Yes, you may run and riot as you choose; you may 
drown thought in drunkenness, and lull conscience asleep ; 
hand may join in hand, and you may say one to another — 
a confederacy — let us shake off superstitious fear — let us 
dispel gloomy forebodings — let us eat, drink, and be merry. 
You may struggle as you can, and strive to get rid of God ; 
but here you are in His keeping — under lock and key. He 
has you safe, reserved until the day of judgment ; and you 
cannot escape — no, not though you call on the rocks and 
mountains to fall on you, and cover you from the wrath of 
the Lamb. 

" Have you no knowledge, ye workers of iniquity 1 no 
consideration, no sense or feeling] What hollow mockery 
of laughter is that which rings through the vaults of the 
dungeon ? Prisoners at their sports ! men doomed to die, 
taking their ease and making merry ! What infatuation — 
what madness is this? Will none of you be sober for a 
moment 1 Will none of you — enclosed, shut in, reserved as 
you are for judgment, so that you cannot "escape — will none 
of you, ere the fatal day dawns and its sun rises on the 
earth, pause and be persuaded to relent, to submit, to sue 
out the freely-offered pardon, to believe and be saved — saved 
now — saved in that day — saved for ever V 3 (Pages 95-96.) 

In future times, when society shall recognise the true 
causes and preventives of criminal action, in all classes of 
men, they will discover that the denunciations and promises 
of the dogmas are slender and inefficacious substitutes for 
the true means of dealing with the evil which God has 
L 2 



164 



SCIEXCE 



AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. X, 



presented to them in Nature, but from the use of which 
these erroneous opinions at present induce them to shrink 
with aversion. This doctrine does not affect the distinction 
between right and wrong* 

* See "Criminal Jurisprudence Considered in Relation to the 
Physiology of the Brain," by Marniaduke B. Sampson. 3rd Edition, 
revised; London, Highly and Son, price 2d.; Lectures on Moral 
Philosophy," by George Combe, Lectures X2X, XIII. , XTV. ; and 
1 ' The Principles of Criminal Legislation and the Practice of Prison 
Discipline Investigated," by George Combe. 



165 



CHAPTER XL 

Conviction ast> Belief. 

The prevalent interpretation of the doctrine of heaven and 
hell, if not supported by Nature, must be fraught with 
tremendous evils to mankind. It is the grand instrument 
by means of which the clergy hold sway over the laity, 
and have acquired a temporal power which enables them in 
many instances to control or embarrass the legislature ; to 
substitute their own interpretations not only for the Bible 
itself, but for the order of Nature, in the instruction of the 
people ; and to prevent the public mind from entering 
honestly and independently into the consideration of many 
departments of natural science, and from drawing unbiassed 
conclusions from them. 

A writer in the Edinburgh Review, after making some 
observations on conventional hypocrisy, proceeds as follows : 
" Then there are the deliberate dishonesties of the learned, 
imposing upon the people what they do not believe them- 
selves, for the sake of the end it is supposed to answer. Sir 
Charles Lyell, in his 1 Second Visit to the United States of 
North America,' Vol. I., p. 222, adduces at length the text 
of the three heavenly witnesses, which no scholar, since 
Porson's investigation of it, professes to believe genuine, 
but which is still, nevertheless, retained in our Bibles, and 
also in those of the Episcopal Church of America, not- 
withstanding their opportunity of expunging it when the 
American Episcopalians revised the Liturgy and struck out 
the Athanasian Creed. This disingenuous timidity has 



1G6 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[chap. XI. 



long been a reflection upon all our religious teachers. It 
is now becoming extremely dangerous to their influence 
and authority. 

"There is no meeting an age of inquiry except in the 
spirit of perfect candour. The question which lies at the 
root of all dogmatic Christianity is the authority of the 
letter of Scripture ; yet, strange to say, that question is 
neither a settled nor an open one even among Protestants. 
All the clergy of almost all sects are afraid of it; and 
the students of Nature, intent only upon facts that God 
has revealed to our senses, have to fight their way against 
the self-same religious prejudice which consigned C4alileo 
to his dungeon. The geologists, following in the track of 
the astronomers, have made good some very important 
positions, and number among them many eminent church- 
men of unquestioned fidelity to their ordination vows. It 
is now, therefore, admitted that the text is not conclusive 
against physical demonstration. 

"Is the text conclusive against moral induction and 
metaphysical inquiry 1 Let a layman put that question, 
and an awful silence is the least forbidding answer he will 
receive. Xo minister of a parish, no master of a school, no 
father of a family in England feels himself free to pursue 
any train of instruction that seems in conflict with a familiar 
text or a dogmatic formula, excepting only the subject 
of the opening verses of Genesis. He is either fearful of the 
ground himself, or he cannot clear his own path for others 
without opening a discussion which is discountenanced on 
all sides and branded with reproachful names. He, in 
spite of himself, must take refuge in evasions and reserve, 
and close a subject of perhaps the liveliest interest to the 
most reverential minds, lest the works of God should seem 
to be at variance with His word. 

" Here is the dilemma which will be found at the bottom 
of the education question of England. This is what is 



CHAP. XI. 1 



CONVICTION AXD BELIEF. 



167 



consciously or unconsciously meant in many important 
quarters by the cry against secular instruction. This is 
why the natural sciences were so long frowned upon in our 
grammar-schools and colleges, and ancient knowledge pre- 
ferred to modern, as a sounder and a holier lore. The 
theology of the Vatican was at home among the pagan 
mythologies, the Aristotelian physics, and the Hebrew cos- 
mogonies ; yet stood in awe of 1 the Tuscan artist's optic 
glass 5 ; and the spirit of the ancient Church has ever since 
been true to that instinct. But Protestantism, we say 
again, and printing have admitted the light of Nature into 
the schools ; and, in the unlimited ecclesiastical freedom 
of the United States, religion and education go hand in 
hand.'' 5 

Few persons conversant with the state of religious 
opinion in Great Britain will question the correctness of this 
representation : especially of that part of it which follows 
the question, " Is the text conclusive against moral induc- 
tion and metaphysical inquiry V 3 Let us look, then, into 
the cause of this humiliating and injurious condition of 
things. 

There is a distinction between conviction and belief. 
To convince a person is to lead his intellect by evidence 
and logical induction to acknowledge a truth previously 
unknown, or to admit a contested proposition. By teaching 
him Astronomy, we may convince him of the rotation and 
revolution of the globe. By showing him the facts of 
Geology and the logical deductions from them, we may 
convince him that the earth has existed for a longer period 
than six thousand years ; and so forth. In these and 
similar instances, we present facts to the observing faculties, 
and employ the reflecting powers to judge of them ; and 
as, when these faculties are normally developed, active, 
and cultivated, they act with precision and uniformity, 
the results which they reach are not voluntary, but are 



1GS 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. XI. 



the natural consequences of their action. In other words, 
conviction depends on evidence presented to the observing 
and intellectual faculties, and is involuntary. 

On the other hand, there are two sources of belief. By 
the constitution of our minds we believe, intuitively, in the 
existence and qualities of certain things when they are 
presented to our observation : we believe also on credit 
or persuasion. Thus, to believe is to credit upon the 
authority of another ; to put confidence in the veracity 
of some one ; to have a firm persuasion of anything. In 
attaining this kind of belief, the intellect does not come 
directly into contact with the thing believed, but reaches 
it through the medium of testimony. 

The tendency to credit testimony depends primarily on 
the emotional faculties. A person endowed with the faculty 
of Wonder feels pleasure in believing in marvellous inci- 
dents and narratives ; one endowed with much Hope and 
little Cautiousness is pre-disposed to believe in a happy 
state, here or hereafter ; one possessing much Cautiousness 
combined with deficient Hope is constitutionally prone to 
believe in a disastrous future. In these instances the 
emotional faculties appear to lead the intellect to embrace 
whatever views are most consonant to their likings, and 
to believe in them. Thus, we had believers in witchcraft ; 
and now we see many believers in ghosts, clairvoyance, 
spirit-rapping, and other mysterious phenomena. The 
causes of these phenomena are not cognisable by the in- 
tellectual faculties ; and hence, in common language; we call 
those who embrace them " believers in them."' 

Among the definitions of " belief ; ' given by Dr. Johnson 
is this : The theological virtue of faith ; firm confidence of the 
truths of religion. But I have endeavoured to show above* 
that belief may be formed by associating, in childhood, 



* Chapter II., page 20 



chap, xi.] CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



169 



almost any form of religious doctrines or opinions with 
the emotional faculties of Veneration and Wonder, and 
that this process is actually carried on with great success 
by the priests of many religions acknowledged by us to 
be false. The rise and establishment of Mormonism, 
in our own day, is an example in point. 

Keeping this distinction in view, let us next remark 
that the rigid dogmatists of nearly every Christian sect 
attach the stupendous reward of heaven to belief, and the 
awful punishment of hell to unbelief, in man- concocted 
articles of faith. The promise of heaven is a lure to all 
the animal, moral, and religious faculties, while the threat 
of hell is an appalling appeal to our selfish feelings. They 
are, therefore, engines of tremendous power for forming 
and maintaining belief. 

I have used the expression man-concocted articles, 
because history tells us that the Eoman Catholic, and 
the Protestant, and almost all other sectarian articles of 
faith, were drawn up by councils or assemblies of fallible 
men who interpreted Scripture with their human faculties, 
and with such human lights as their own ages afforded, 
which we know were scanty enough, compared with the 
duty they had upon hand : viz., to fix the articles which 
they themselves and all their posterity should believe as 
their passport to heaven and their protection from heM. 

Not only so, but we know that many of these articles 
were the subjects of vehement dispute among the members 
of these councils and assemblies, and that several of them 
were admitted into the code of Divine truths by narrow 
majorities ! Nevertheless, it is to belief in articles of 
faith thus enacted that strict dogmatists of every sect 
assign heaven, and to unbelief in them, hell. The Pro- 
testants may be heard vehemently denouncing the Eoman 
Catholic faith as soul-destroying error, while the Pope 
prohibits, under the severest penalties, every one from 



170 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. XI. 



teaching his subjects Protestant Christianity, and for the 
same reason. In his opinion, it is soul-destroying error. 
Moreover, every sect, when it sends forth its missionaries 
to convert the heathen, gives them a commission to teach 
its own doctrines as the only certain way of salvation. 

Few sects assign salvation to those who conscientiously 
study the Scriptures, and interpret and believe them as 
their own unbiassed understandings dictate, whether the 
results be orthodox or not ; and fewer of them still allow 
an entrance into heaven to conscientious men who cannot 
believe in any recognised form of Christianity. The Pro- 
testants profess to grant freedom of inquiry ; but how, if 
they sincerely did so, could they consistently proclaim the 
conscientious interpretations of any human being to be 
soul- destroying errors 1 

When we contemplate a body of intelligent men who 
are cognisant not only of these facts, but of the great 
difficulties attending the questions of the authenticity and 
inspiration of the books of the Old and New Testaments, 
and of the inroads which science is making on the 
established interpretations of them * — I say, when we 
contemplate men in such circumstances day by day, and 
with unhesitating confidence threatening hell as the punish- 
ment of unbelief, and promising heaven as the reward of 
belief in their own peculiar doctrines, we are astounded at 

* Astronomy has overturned the belief of educated men in Joshua's 
commanding the sun and moon to stand still, and in God's fearing 
that men should reach heaven by building a high tower : the Tower 
of Babel. Geology has shaken the credibility of the Hebrew account 
of the Creation, and also of the Deluge. Natural History has demon- 
strated that the ark could not contain all the animals of the world ; 
for many of them did not exist in the region where Noah embarked, 
and others could not live in an ark. These sciences, combined with 
Physiology, have shaken the doctrine that death was introduced in 
consequence of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit. 



CHAP, xi.] CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



171 



their boldness, and are thrown Lack upon a variety of 
hypotheses to account for the spectacle. 

These threats and promises, too, be it observed, are 
publicly addressed to many laymen who are perfectly 
cognisant of all that is here stated. If the clergy could 
only hear the comments which such hearers make on 
their discourses, they would pause in their career. Some 
persons may be heard remarking that the preacher is only 
discharging a professional duty, like a lawyer pleading a 
cause ; and that, his own convictions going beyond the 
narrow^ boundaries of his creed, he has no liberty of in- 
dependent thought and action ; and where there is no 
freedom there can be no responsibility. But what an 
appalling supposition, to imagine a human being who 
believes in a God at all consciously investing doctrines 
with Divine authority, and enforcing belief in them on 
others, by means of heaven and hell, merely as a pro- 
fessional exercise, regardless, alike of their human origin, 
and of the uncertainty which he knows to exist as to their 
absolute truth ! 

Another supposition, frequently hazarded, is that the 
preacher employs these portentous engines of belief from 
habit, without much consideration of their import. This 
I can readily suppose, for few men could indulge in pro- 
clamations of eternal misery if they formed an adequate 
conception of all that it implies. 

During the war between Great Britain and France, a 
near relative of mine happened to go with a friend into 
Edinburgh Castle on some business, when they observed 
a regiment forming in a circle within the walls. They 
stopped to see what the movement meant. It was pre- 
paratory to a military punishment. The two civilians were 
led, by an irresistible curiosity, to watch the subsequent 
proceedings. It happened that, before this occurred, my 
relative had frequently discussed the subject of the eternity 



172 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[chap. XI. 



of future punishment with his friend, who maintained 
sternly the orthodox opinions on this point. They saw 
the culprit tied up ; the lashing commenced ; the blood 
flowed, and they heard acute cries of agony. They became 
sick, and left the scene in disgust. 

As they retired, my relative said to his friend, " What 
amount of sin, in your opinion, would justify that infliction 
continued through eternity ? " The reply was, " Good 
God ! no human being could, in a whole lifetime, incur 
guilt that would justify that torture for a week ! " This 
individual never afterwards believed in the eternity of 
hell torments. He had here the means of comprehending 
what human torture really is, and his whole being revolted 
from the idea of its endless duration. Previously, hell was 
to him little more than a word, but now he could form 
some definite notion of the horrors implied in it. 

The grand cause, however, of the prevalent use of 
future reward and punishment to support belief in man- 
concocted articles of faith, appears to me to be this. By 
laying down the corruption of human nature as a funda- 
mental proposition in religion, and founding on it the 
doctrine of mams natural aversion to holiness and virtue, 
and his natural incapacity to discern Divine truth, the 
dogmatists deprive themselves of a secure resting-place 
in science and in human nature for religion and morality. 
Some time ago I heard a sermon preached by an able 
divine on the text, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as 
thyself." In answer to the inquiry, How shall we be able 
to love our neighbours as ourselves] he said that the philo- 
sophers present us only with motives of prudence or of 
selfishness, which can never produce disinterested goodness ; 
and that the only means of becoming capable of fulfilling 
the precept is to obtain the influence of the Holy Spirit, 
in answer to prayer. " Ask, and it shall be given unto you.'"' 
The Holy Spirit alone, said he, can plant in the human 



CHAP, xi.] CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



173 



mind true Christian charity and brotherly love ; secondary 
means may cultivate it after it is so planted, but can do 
nothing to produce it. 

But I ask, If God instituted the world, and endowed 
man with all his functions, may we not truly say that all 
our gifts proceed from Him, and that secondary means 
can only cultivate, improve, and direct them ] Further, if 
the feeling of pure disinterested goodness, prompting us 
to love our neighbour as ourselves for the sake of making 
him happy, without any selfish object of our own, is 
communicated to us when an active organ of Benevo- 
lence is bestowed on us : is not this an example of God's 
grace producing the emotion in a way which those mis- 
interpreters of Scripture and repucliators of Xature 
erroneously deny i 

According to the doctrine now referred to, all religious 
attainments and hopes rest on belief in doctrines of which 
the clergy are virtually the interpreters. The original 
records are not directly accessible to the laity, and hence 
it is impossible for them, generally speaking, to reach 
conviction in regard to the basis on which morality, religion, 
and salvation are said to rest. Belief] therefore, is the only 
alternative left to them ; and belief being, in the dogmatical 
view, indispensable to salvation, and salvation being trans- 
cendently important, some of the clergy act as if they 
thought all appliances to produce belief justifiable. If 
any inquirer desires to reach conviction rather than to 
rest satisfied with beliefs he is not referred to Nature and 
to legitimate inductions from it, but to books written in 
dead languages, and to volumes of disputation concerning 
the authors of these books, the genuineness of the text, 
the degree in which the text is inspired, and, finally, the 
soundness of discordant interpretations of it, on belief in 
which salvation is said to depend. 

On all these points the difficulties are increasing, instead 



174 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. XI. 

of diminishing, with the advances of scholarship and 
science.* If personal and social well-being depend on 
the fulfilment of natural conditions instituted by God, 
then no religion resting exclusively on belief in dogmas 
which ignore these conditions can be thoroughly practical. 
Moreover, I have attempted to show that the order of 
the Divine administration of this world is unfolded to 
man by means of the instruments through which it is 
conducted ; that it is addressed equally to the intellectual 
and to the emotional faculties ; and that, therefore, before 
a religion of conviction — i.e., a religion based on discernible 
manifestations of Divine wisdom, goodness, and power, 
cognisable by the intellect, gratifying to the moral and 
religious emotions, and conducing, practically, to the well- 
being of the race — can be attained, we must resort to the 
records of these manifestations in the Book of Nature, and 
from them extract elements for the formation of our faith. 

In every religion we shall find that, in proportion to the 
importance attached to pure belief is the extent of super- 
stition in its followers, and of domination in its clergy. 
The Hindu, Mahommedan, Eoman Catholic, and Protestant 
religions may be selected as examples. The priests of the 
first and second exact belief without a shadow of free 
investigation, and their flocks are their blind fanatical 
puppets, and are also the recipients of every degrading 
superstition the priests choose to teach them. The Eoman 
Catholic priesthood, also, require unreasoning belief, and 
their power is proportionally great, and their peculiar doc- 
trines proportionally distant from reason. The Protestant 

* See "An Inquiry Concerning the Origin of Christianity/ 1 
by 0. Hennell. 2nd Edition. " The Creed of Christendom," by 
W. Eathtone Greg. "The Essence of Christianity," by Ludwig 
Eeuerbach; 1854. Prize Essay — "Christianity and Infidelity," by 
S. S. Hennell. London : Hall, Virtue and Co. ; 1857. 



chap, xi.] COXVICTION AND BELIEF. 175 

laity are nominally allowed freedom of inquiry; and in 
proportion to the use they have made of this privilege 
is their religion rational, and their subjection to clerical 
dominion mitigated. 

It is necessary only to refer to the sects which have 
renounced the most appalling of the dogmas cited above,* 
as containing the most independent thinkers and least 
priest-ridden portion of the Christian laity. The clergy 
of those sects, having lost their priestly power, appeal to 
reason, and to man's moral and religious emotions, as the 
means of guiding their flocks. They substitute conviction 
for belief, and so train the laity to mental independence, 
and to become the sincere friends of human progress. 

The practice of founding religion on dogmas which 
cannot bear the investigation of reason, is attended with 
another great evil. It is the cause why the Christian 
clergy, like Levites among the Jews and the priests in 
idolatrous countries, constitute a class apart from the 
laity. The Scotch advocate formerly mentioned, who had 
been educated as a clergyman in the Church of Scotland, 
but subsequently embraced the legal profession, mentioned 
to me that so completely are the clergy a separate class, 
that were two of them, one from John-o'-Groat s House, 
and another from Gretna Green, to meet for the first time 
in their lives, even at an inn, they would in a short time 
enter upon an interchange of opinions upon religion and 
Church government, and Church politics, far more con- 
fidential than either of them would venture to indulge 
in with his own lay father or brother. 

The same reserve infects the laity in their communi- 
cations with their spiritual guides. When I visited Boston, 
in the United States of America, I happened to mention to 
the Eev. Dr. Charming some opinions which I had heard 



* Pages 107, 110. 



* 



17G SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. xi. 

discussed the previous day at a dinner party, consisting of 
lawyers, physicians, and merchants, when he observed, 
" This is very interesting to me. But for you, a stranger, I 
should never have learned that such views are entertained ; 
and yet it is of great importance to clergymen to know the 
real sentiments of the laity on religious doctrines. I have 
often told my lay friends that I desire nothing more 
ardently than to hear their true convictions ; and I have 
assured them that whatever these may be, if I am satisfied 
that they are honestly entertained, the holders of them shall 
not forfeit my esteem. But," he added, "it has been all in 
vain. They fear to hurt my feelings by contesting my 
opinions : they erect a barrier of good breeding between 
themselves and their clergy, which no skill of mine has been 
able to break through." 

This is a grave charge against the laity, and, in my 
opinion, it is well founded. By concealing their real 
opinions concerning the doctrines and worship sanctioned 
by the standards of their Churches, they render it impossible 
for the most upright and enlightened members of the clerical 
profession to move a step towards reformation. Xo clergy- 
man can proclaim doubts in the soundness of the dogmas 
which, probably in the immaturity of his understanding and 
in the absence of experience, he has vowed to preach, while 
the laity continue ostensibly to uphold them. The move- 
ment towards reformation must commence with the laity* 
By expressing openly and honestly their dissatisfaction with 
things as they stand, they will afford the clergy, many of 
whom are groaning in creed-imposed fetters, encouragement 
and opportunity to declare whatever changes the increase 
of learning and the evolution of scientific truths may have 
produced on their convictions. The laity act an unmanly 
and dishonourable part in secretly condemning what they 
publicly support. 

How strongly do such cases indicate unsoundness in the 



CHAP. XI.] 



CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



177 



creeds which lead to such reserve : yet it arises exclusively 
from the dogmatic elements introduced into our religion. 
As before mentioned, Christian theology is to the laity an 
occult science, resting on interpretations of Hebrew and 
Greek records : and belief m certain doctrines is the founda- 
tion of all their hopes. There is no common ground, 
therefore, on which the ordinary layman and his pastor can 
meet to discuss the merits of their faith. It stands apart 
from Nature and secular experience ; unbelief and misbelief 
involve eternal perdition ; and there is thus no alternative 
left to the layman but to surrender his conscience and 
understanding to his spiritual master, or to encounter (as he 
thinks) the risk of losing his soul. The Pope and his clergy 
proclaim this as the natural result of their faith, and they 
act consistently in doing so. The Protestant clergy, on the 
other hand, de facto exercise the same authority over the 
unlearned laity, while they profess to acknowledge the right 
of individual judgment. 

These considerations are urged with no hostile design 
against religion. They are presented with an earnest desire 
to strengthen its foundations and to extend its usefulness. 
The Edinburgh Review for October, 1840, expresses wonder 
that there should be so small a proportion of sermons 
destined to live : that, out of the 'million and upwards 
preached annually throughout the empire, there should be 
a very few that are remembered three whole days after they 
are delivered — fewer still that are committed to the press, 
scarcely one that is not in a few years absolutely forgotten- 
One explanation may be given of these facts. As the 
sermons are preached by the best educated men in the 
country, and by men of at least average abilities, the subjects 
of them must be such that they do not stand in a natural 
relation to the human faculties, and therefore, even when 
supported by the religious emotions, do not permanently 
interest or edify their hearers. 

M 



178 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. XI. 



How then, it may be asked, do the sermons continue to 
be listened to with even the appearance of devotion ? The 
answer is : the dogmas, having been entwined with the 
religious emotions of the people from infancy, are regarded 
as Divine truths ; and the preachers, by repeating them, 
excite the emotions, and thus listening becomes an act of 
Divine worship. But in this monotonous practice there is 
no progress towards a higher development of human intelli- 
gence, virtue, and happiness. In consequence, the Christian 
religion, as now interpreted, actually stands still : nay, it is 
the boast of the adherents of the dogmas that it must 
necessarily do so, until it shall bring all opinions under its 
sway. But this standing still in the midst of a host of 
assailants striving— and not altogether without success 
— to undermine its very foundations, and in the midst 
of a rapidly advancing stream of scientific knowledge 
at variance with its dogmas, cannot fail to sap its 
strength. 

It has been stated above* that when the intellectual 
faculties furnish the emotional faculties of Wonder and 
Veneration with knowledge of the qualities and phenomena 
of Nature, the two sets of faculties acting together generate 
an intuitive belief in the existence of a supernatural Power 
and Intelligence. We can give no account of the origin of 
this belief, except by assuming that the faculties of normal 
men are so constituted in relation to Nature that it excites 
it in them. But we learn by observation that where 
knowledge of Nature is so deficient that the mind cannot 
comprehend the order and the lessons of Nature, the religious 
emotions, in seeking for the supernatural, are liable to go 
astray into gross superstitions, and that the intellect then 
invents idols, demons, witches, and other monstrous objects 
or imaginary beings to which the emotions cling. The 



* Page 29. 



chap, xi.] CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



170 



supernatural, therefore, in one form or other, appears to be 
indispensable to their satisfaction. 

Accordingly, we find that the founders of the Hindu 
and Mahomniedan religions based them on alleged super- 
natural communications. Belief in their sacred books was 
not produced by reason and evidence, but by the aid of 
authority, the promise of reward, and the threat of punish- 
ment. The assurance of a Divine origin was accepted by 
the ^people, because, in tXe actual condition of their intel- 
ligence, it satisfied their love of the supernatural. Being 
communicated to the young from generation to generation, 
and supported by public opinion and many social advantages, 
these religions have had an abiding endurance. 

Both natural and communicated religions, therefore, 
appear to rest on the basis of the supernatural, real or pre- 
tended : for although it may appear paradoxical, it seems 
nevertheless true that it is the intuitive belief that all the 
qualities and phenomena of Nature manifest a super- 
natural Power that fits the rules which they reveal for 
human guidance to become religious laws. If this view 
be sound, religious belief founded on the objects and 
phenomena of Nature cannot be shaken, because these 
objects and phenomena are constantly present as sources 
of conviction, and the human faculties are all adapted to 
receive as Divine the lessons logically deducible from them. 

The Hindu religion does not possess this quality of 
stability, and hence it requires, and has received, support 
from external motives. In consequence of this weakness, 
it is in constant danger of being subverted by the revelations 
of Divine truth in Nature : but much less so, by another 
communicated faith, however much superior it may be to 
itself. When the Bible is presented to its votaries, they 
examine it with their intellects alone, and in general it does 
not appear to them to possess the character of a Divine 
message. Their minds are pre-occupiecl by their own 
M 2 



ISO 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. XI. 



supernatural communications. As these have not been 
embraced from reason, but from authority and training, 
and as they have been supported only by the authority of 
their priests, by the law, and by public opinion, Christianity 
has not yet succeeded in extinguishing this faith and in 
taking its place. 

Ida Pffeifer informs us that the Christian villages or 
communities in India are composed of orphan children left 
utterly destitute by visitations of the cholera, who were 
collected and clothed, fed, educated, and trained by 
Christian missionaries : in other words, training has made 
them Christians as it had made their fathers Hindus. 
But generally speaking, the Hindu people, satisfied with 
their own religion, continue to reject the religion of their 
conquerors. 

The missionaries find it extremely difficult to undo the 
connection formed in their minds between the doctrines of 
that faith and their religious emotions. The Rev. Dr. Duff, 
a missionary from the Church of Scotland to Bengal, per- 
ceived the obstacles to his success presented by this state of 
things, and begged of the Church to send him the means of 
instructing the Hindus in Natural Science, in order to 
prepare them to receive Christianity. In his pamphlet, 
entitled The Church of Scotland's Indian Jfission,* he says 
of the Hindus, that with them the argument for Christi- 
anity from miracles is utterly powerless. " They retort 
that they themselves have miracles far more stupendous. 
And, doubtless, if mere gross magnitude is considered, they 
say what is true : for in this respect their miracles set all 
comparison at defiance. Besides, with them the original 
miracles form an inherent part of their theology ; and they 
have no notion of what is meant by an appeal to them in 
order to authenticate a doctrine. And modern miracles 



*Fagc 3 (1835), 



CHAP. XI.] 



CONVICTION AND BELIEF. 



181 



they have in such abundance, that they are exhibited on 
the most trivial occasions, and become matters of daily 
occurrence. 5 ' 

The means of teaching Natural Science have been 
supplied in Bengal, and have been largely taken advantage 
of by intelligent young Hindus ; but, according to my 
information, they apply the knowledge thus acquired to 
refute the Bible. Be it observed that the missionaries and 
the Christian laymen who have taught them Natural Science 
have abstained from investing it with a sacred character : 
have not represented it as revealing rules of practical 
conduct which are directly related to the moral and religious 
faculties of man, and therefore, calculated by teaching and 
training to become moral and religious truths. The conse- 
quence is the production of unbelief in all religions. 
Surely natural religion would be less dangerous than none. 

The Greeks and the Romans had no written records pro- 
fessing to proceed directly from their gods. Their religion 
was traditionary, and rested on physical representations of 
their deities in statuary, and on temples, rites, and cere- 
monies. We have seen how obstinately Christianity is 
resisted by the Hindus in consequence of the pre-occupation 
of their religious emotions by a religion which they believe 
to have proceeded from a supernatural source. When the 
Christian religion was presented to the Greeks and the 
Romans, it did not meet with any obstacle of this kind, for 
they had no Divine records. Its success among them was, 
therefore, proportionately easy and great ; and it spread also 
among all those nations whose brains were well formed, and 
who had no previous sacred books to pre-occupy them. 
Among most of the tribes of the native American Indians 
it failed, apparently because their cerebral organs were so 
defective that they could not comprehend it. 

These facts appear to show that it is much more difficult 
to subvert a religion alleged to rest on a supernatural basis 



182 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. XL 

than to infuse a new faith, claiming such an origin, intc 
minds not pre-occupied by belief in supernatural communi- 
cations. Might not a religion, founded on the rules of 
belief and conduct revealed to us by God in the agencies 
and phenomena of Nature, aid us in rooting out superstitions 
which we rind it so difficult to exterminate merely by pre- 
senting another supernatural revelation, however superior 
in truth and practical utility ? If the missionaries would 
teach the dictates of science for human guidance as re- 
ligious as well as intellectual truths to the Hindus, they 
might bring them at least nearer to Christianity. 



183 



CHAPTER XII. 

The Dogmas as Practical Rules. 

Ix Legislation, also, the obstructive effects of the Dogmas 
may be observed. If this world is an Institution, it follows 
that personal and social prosperity can be reached only by 
studying the agencies of Nature, and by conforming to the 
rules of conduct which they prescribe. In this view, the 
function of the human legislator is simply to discover and 
apply the rules of action dictated by the Divine Lawgiver. 
In my opinion, science has already made such progress that 
valuable rules have been demonstrated, conformity to which 
will aid us in securing healthy constitutions at birth, and 
in preserving them unimpaired by disease throughout life : 
also in the production and distribution of wealth : in the 
elevation and refinement of our mental faculties : in the 
attainment of social distinction and other objects of legiti- 
mate ambition : in short, in the improvement of our minds 
and bodies, and the augmentation of our happiness, as 
individuals ; and more emphatically still, in reaching 
national prosperity. 

Xo human legislature cart produce any beneficial results, 
private or public, except by acting in conformity with the 
order of Nature ; while it may, and often does, call forth 
floods of suffering and disappointment by enacting and en- 
forcing laws in opposition to it. Yet the mere suggestion 
of such an idea in the British Parliament would probably 
call forth shouts of laughter and derision. There is no 
more recognition of a Divine government of the world in 
our legislature than there was in that of Greece and of 



184 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION 



[chap. XII. 



Rome ; and religion is never heard of, as a basis of legis- 
lation, except when some miserable sectarian interest 
demands the aid of Parliament for its aggrandisement or 
its protection. 

And what is the cause of this untoward state of things 1 
The interpretations of Scripture embodied in our prevailing 
dogmas, which have usurped the place of Christianity, 
represent this world as a wreck, and as incapable of improve- 
ment, except by supernatural means, which can be evoked 
only by conduct in conformity with the dictates of Church 
standards and catechisms ! The national mind discerns no 
actual intelligible Divine government in the world, and 
practical men find the principles laid down as Divine in the 
dogmas little applicable to secular affairs. Hence comes 
the exclusion of the recognition of God's government of the 
world from our legislature, and also of all religion whatever ! 
Hence, also, the exclusion of instruction in the rules of 
this government from schools, colleges, churches, and 
literature ! 

What are the substitutes in Parliament for knowledge of 
these rules ? In all but a few great minds, we have only 
crude and conflicting notions about the laws of commerce, 
health, crime, education, and all the natural agencies which 
are producing the weal or woe of mankind. Hence, finally, 
government by party combinations, in supporting which, 
men of honourable character do not hesitate, when in oppo- 
sition, to maintain in debate that a principle or a measure 
is wmolly wrong, which, when in power, they defended as 
entirely sound and beneficial, or vice versd. When a 
Divine government shall be recognised, such conduct will 
become indicative only of intellectual weakness or of moral 
dishonesty, and this stigma on our national reputation will 
cease. 

In the legislation of the despotic countries of Europe, the 
effects of ignoring a Divine government of the world are 



CHAP, xil] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 185 



still more disastrous. The Sovereign claims to reign by 
Divine right, and uses the dogmas to banish from the 
minds of his subjects every notion that he exercises only a 
delegated power, and that he and they live under laws 
enacted by an Authority which controls every act of his 
legislation, and produces good or evil from it, irrespective 
of his intentions or wishes. 

The Emperor of Russia, for example, appears not to 
perceive that, by the order of Nature, an empire can attain 
the necessaries, comforts, and luxuries of life, which are 
indispensable to the enjoyment of the people as individuals, 
and to their strength as a nation, only by employing labour 
and skill in the development of their natural resources ; 
and that knowledge, morality, and economy are necessary 
to their success. Apparently he does not believe that 
national greatness does not consist in mere length and 
breadth of territory and numbers of subjects ; or that the 
extension of his sovereignty over comparatively barren 
regions and barbarous men has the natural tendency to 
distract his attention from raising the physical and moral 
condition of his people, as well as to weaken the central 
power, by stretching it over too wide a space, and thereby 
to lead to feeble and corrupt government, thence to 
anarchy, and finally to the dissolution of his empire. 

His religious dogmas have taught him that he is the 
vicegerent of God in his own dominions ; but apparently 
he does not perceive that Divine rules of conduct are 
prescribed by the order of Nature, and he acts as if they 
had no existence. Hence, he desires to augment his 
dominions by absorbing into them Circassia, Turkey, 
Persia, and other barbarous countries, wholly blind to the 
inevitable exhaustion of the wealth, and destruction of the 
welfare, of the most civilised and industrious, and there- 
fore the most estimable and valuable, portion of his subjects 
in gratifying this unwise ambition. From not perceiving 



186 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. xh. 

that these projects are immoral and that, by the law of 
Nature, nothing that is immoral is permanent and strong, 
he does not discern the certain disastrous future which he 
is now providing for his empire. 

By a patient exposition of the modes of action of the 
natural forces, physical and moral which determine human 
well-being or suffering, these results, in my opinion, might 
be demonstrated ; and yet religious dogmas exclude even 
the attempt to investigate the rules of conduct which they 
dictate, and discountenance their application to practical 
purposes ! 

Another disastrous effect of the dogmas is seen in their 
influence in obstructing the education of the people. Many 
religious men denounce the teachiug of science as " godless 
education/'' While they are thus nearly unanimous in 
practically rejecting the course of Providence in Nature as 
a source of instruction, each places in the hands of the 
young its own Catechism of doctrines, its Liturgy, its 
Confession of Faith, or its other articles of belief ; and with 
the most pertinacious assiduity labours to imprint these 
indelibly on the memory, and to embed them in the affec- 
tions of its pupils. Meanwhile, many of the sects denounce 
the catechisms, liturgies, and confessions of certain others 
as unsound and unscriptural and as dangerous to the 
eternal welfare of the people. Here, then, is a record un- 
questionably Divine, in so far as we read it rightly, 
superseded and set aside for books of human compilation, 
denounced as unsound by large masses of the community. 

The effect of this on education is described by Mr. Hora : e 
Mann* in the following words : — " After the particular 

* "Report of an Educational Tour in Germany and Parr? of 
Great Britain and Ireland," by Horace Mann, Esq., Secretary of 
the Board of Education, Massachusetts, U.S. With Preface and 
Notes, by W. B. Hodgson. London: SiinpkrUj Marshall and Co. ; 1846. 



chap, xil] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 1S7 

attention which I gave to this subject (religious instruction), 
both in England and Scotland, I can say, without any 
exception, that in those schools where religious creeds, and 
forms of faith, and modes of worship were directly taught, 
I found the common doctrines and injunctions of morality, 
and the meaning of the preceptive parts of the Gospel, to 
be much less taught and muchless understood by the pupils 
than in the same grade of schools, and by the same classes 
of pupils with us," in Massachusetts, where the teaching of 
all sectarian doctrines in common schools is prohibited by 
law. Is not this sacrificing Christianity itself at the shrine 
of sectarianism \ 

The elements of which a sect is composed are the points 
in which it differs from other sects : and its existence 
depends on the success and assiduity with which it infuses 
a knowledge of and reverence for these into the minds of 
the young. It represents them as subjects of the utmost 
importance to their temporal and eternal welfare. In 
the estimation of its zealous leaders, they greatly surpass 
in practical as well as religious importance the order of 
Nature. If any sect were to cease investing its points 
of difference with the highest reverence in the estima- 
tion of its pupils, and to begin to magnify the truth 
and utility of the doctrines in which all are agreed, it 
would commit felo de s*. Its dissolution and fusion into 
the general body of Christian believers would be inevitable 
and speedy. The more completely, therefore, that the 
different sects obtain the command of education, the greater 
will be the obstacles to the introduction of the order of 
Nature into schools. 

The points on which all Christian sects are agreed must 
constitute the essential substance of Christianity : because 
it is on these that Christian men of all denominations act 
in the business and relations of life. Pious, honest, and 
benevolent men abound in them all : and this common 



183 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. xii. 

excellence must spring from a common source. The points 
on which they differ, although forming the life-blood and 
the bonds of union of sects, cannot constitute Christianity ; 
because, if they did, the Christian religion would really 
have scarcely any form or substance. It would consist of 
abstract disquisitions, discernible only by microscopic eyes, 
and inapplicable to all beneficent ends. Who shall say 
that the points of faith in which the Church of England 
differs from the Congregationalists— or the views of Church 
government in which the Free Church differs from the 
Established Church of Scotland — or the Secession Church 
from the Free Church — or the Scotch Episcopalian Church 
from them all — are the essential elements of Christianity 1 

And yet it is for the sake of maintaining these distinctions 
from generation to generation, and of transmitting to the 
remotest posterity the bitter contentions which have so 
frequently vexed the spirits and alloyed the happiness of 
this age, that we are called on to exclude instruction in the 
course of Nature, as a guide to human conduct, from our 
schools ; to reject a system of education founded on the 
points in which all are agreed • to prostrate the national 
mind beneath the car of sectarianism, and to allow it to be 
crushed and distorted by its unhallowed wheels ! 

Practical Christianity, on the other hand, and the laws 
of Nature, physical, organic, and moral, present the same 
instruction and recommend the same line of action to all, 
and are, therefore, destructive of sectarianism. Hence the 
cry of infidelity which all sects raise against them ! Obedi- 
ence to them is calculated to bind man to man, and nation 
to nation, by the ties of reciprocal interest as well as of affec- 
tion and duty, and to bring all into communion with God. 
Our knowledge of them grows with the growth of science, 
and their influence increases with the augmentation of the 
prosperity which obedience to their dictates yields. 

Every motive of duty and interest, therefore, calls on 



chap, xil] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 



189 



the laity and the Legislature to disenthral education from 
the dominion of sects, and to allow to God's providence a 
fair field for working out its beneficial ends. Disguise the 
fact as we will, the order of Nature — in other words, God's 
secular providence — is a power which in this world shapes 
our destinies for weal or for woe ; while the peculiar 
doctrines of sectarianism only exalt the consequence and 
the power of clerical teachers, and of the few zealous laymen 
wdio constitute their staff. 

To vote money, therefore, as was done under the 
Minutes of Council of August and December, 1846, to 
every sect, to enable it to educate its own members in its 
own religious doctrines, is actually to endow discord. It is 
deserting the shrine of reason and of moral and religious 
principle, and bowing at that of prejudice and bigotry. 
It is renouncing all reverence for God's providence, as 
revealed in the course of Nature ; for every one of the sects, 
if it does not exclude, deny, and denounce the order of 
Nature as a source of practical instruction to the young, 
at least practically treats it as a matter of small import- 
ance compared with its own peculiar dogmas. To give 
them the public money to enable them to pursue this 
course of instruction more effectually is to encourage 
them to place their own wisdom high above that of the 
Creator. 

Nor is this the worst feature of the case. To make the 
teaching of God's order of providence in Nature as religious 
truth, if the dogmas are not taught along with it, an in- 
surmountable objection to granting public aid to secular 
schools is actually treating the Divine laws as dangerous, 
and, however unintentional, with contumely ; yet this was 
the rule of the Committee of Council on Education.* 

Truth alone can benefit a nation, and the doctrines of 



* See Appendix, No. IY. 



190 



SCIEXCE AXD RELIGION. 



[chap. xii. 



all sects cannot possibly be true : to give each of them 
public money, therefore, to teach its own tenets is to endow 
equally truth and error. It is tantamount, in physics, to 
setting in motion antagonistic forces ; in cookery, to paying 
one man to pour wormwood, and another sugar, into the 
cup of which the nation is to drink. By all means allow 
the men who prefer wormwood to fill their own bowl with 
it, and those who prefer sugar to fill theirs with sugar ; 
but let not the Government, which superintends the cup 
out of which all must drink, pay men with national money 
to destroy the contents of that cup. and thus to render 
them a potion which no human palate can endure. To pay 
all sects, who are teaching solemn contradictions, implies 
an utter disbelief in any intelligible order of God's provi- 
dence on earth. It deliberately supersedes the teaching of 
it, and plants conflicting catechisms, liturgies, and con- 
fessions in its place. If the heads of the Government 
cannot discern in science an exposition of the order of 
Nature, or, in other words, of the course of God's providence 
on earth, they may at least so far defer to Divine Wisdom 
and Intelligence as to believe that God's providence, how- 
ever dark, must be self-consistent, and that it does not 
promise to prosper contradictions ! 

Will not the men of intellect and science who see this to 
be the case assume courage, speak out, and help to stem the 
torrent of sectarianism which overflows the land 1 They 
have it in their power at this moment to do their country 
an invaluable service, for which she would one clay rear 
monuments of gratitude to their names. Will they, through 
fear of a little temporary obloquy, desert the standard of 
truth, of God, and of the people ? Let their own consciences 
answer the appeal, and let them act as their consciences 
dictate. Will no teachers arise, imbued with knowledge of 
the order of Nature, as unfolded in science, and, with faith 
in its adaptation to the human faculties, communicate it. 



chap, xil] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 191 

under the sanction of the religious sentiments, to the young, 
as a help to guide them through the thorny paths of life 1 
Yes ! Such teachers exist, and they lack only the counte- 
nance of the enlightened laity to follow the strong impulses 
of their affections and understandings, and accomplish this 
great improvement in secular instruction. 

Moreover, under the sectarian system, not only is the 
advancing intelligence of the people shackled by the con- 
secrated errors of the dark ages, but the most vigorous and 
profound thinkers among the clergy of all denominations 
are subdued and held in thraldom by their feebler brethren. 
The men of inferior endowments and inferior intelligence 
take their stand on the accredited dogmas, which they 
cherish because they are in accordance with their own 
narrow and prejudiced perceptions ; and they resist every 
liberal idea and study that has the most remote appearance 
of conflicting with their pre-conceived ideas. As they 
exert a great influence over a half-educated people, trained 
to regard their doctrines with holy reverence, the more 
powerful minds too generally retire from the field, and leave 
to the sectaries an undisputed sway. 

The best interests of society suffer from this unhappy 
state of things ; whereas if Xature were taught, as the har- 
monious ally of a sounder interpretation of Christianity, 
the men endowed with the profoundest intellects, and with 
the purest and most elevated emotions, would lead the 
general mind, and we should constantly advance. In the 
present time, the leaders of the Calvinistic sects are 
strenuously exerting themselves to bring back the 
public sentiment to the opinions of the middle of the 
seventeenth century ; and if they do not succeed, it is 
science alone that will prevent this consummation of their 
labours. 

From the neglect of Xature by the sects, and the para- 
mount importance which they attach to their own peculiar 



192 



SCIENCE AXD RELIGION. [chap. xn. 



doctrines, they languish when not excited by contention 
among themselves. Dr. Candlish illustrated this fact when 
he called on the Free Church to renew and proclaim its 
" testimony ; n in other words, constantly to obtrude on 
public attention the peculiar views which distinguish it 
from all other sects. He assigned, as the motive for doing 
so, the danger of decay with which he felt it to be 
threatened, from its distinctive characteristics being for- 
gotten, seeing that its standards, doctrines, and discipline 
are identical with those of the Established Church of 
Scotland. There is no perennial source of activity and 
progress in any doctrine that is not in harmony with and 
supported by the course of Nature. A scheme, on the 
contrary, founded on Christianity interpreted in conformity 
with God's natural laws, will enjoy an inherent vitality and 
a self -rectifying energy that will cause it constantly to 
flourish and advance. It will in time root out sectarian 
errors, and unite all classes in the bonds of harmonious 
truth. 

In advocating a non-sectarian system of national educa- 
tion, I do not propose to deliver over scholars and teachers 
to Government officers, with power to mould their minds 
into whatever forms our rulers may prefer, as some ad- 
vocates of sectarian instruction pretend. The United States 
of America have set us a bright example in this enterprise. 
They have divided their country into convenient spaces, 
and designated them as school-districts. The existing law 
of Massachusetts (Revised Statutes, 1835, title x., chap. 23) 
ordains that districts containing fifty families shall main- 
tain one school— districts containing one hundred and fifty 
families shall provide two schools : and so forth — " in which 
children shall be instructed in reading, writing, geography, 
arithmetic, and good behaviour by teachers of competent 
ability and good morals/ 3 Larger districts, again, are 
required to maintain a school i; in which the history of the 



CHAP, xn.] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 193 



United States, book-keeping, surveying, geometry, and 
algebra shall be taught." And if the locality shall contain 
four thousand inhabitants, the teacher shall, "in addition 
to all the branches above enumerated, be competent to 
instruct in the Latin and Greek languages, general history, 
rhetoric, and logic." The law requires the inhabitants to 
raise money by taxing themselves for supporting these 
schools, and ordains them to appoint committees annually 
for managing them.* 

We are told, however, by some able opponents of the 
educational scheme introduced by the orders of Council, 
that Government has no right to interfere with the secular 
instruction of the people, and that voluntary effort is 
adequate to accomplish all that is needed for the public 
welfare. In my "Bemarks on National Education,"' I 
endeavoured to show that Government is not only entitled, 
but is bound, to enable the people, by legislative aid, to 
organise their own wealth and intelligence for the establish- 
ment and maintenance of schools for universal instruction ; 
and I now beg to add that experience shows that legislative 
aid far excels voluntary effort in this good work. 

England [1857] has been left to voluntary effort for the 
education of her people from the foundation of her institu- 
tions, and what has been the result ? Mr. Horace Mann, in 
his " Educational Tour," says : " England is the only one 
among the nations of Europe, conspicuous for its civilisation 
and resources, which has not, and never has had, any system 
for the education of its people. Audit is the country where, 
incomparably beyond any other, the greatest and most appal- 
ling social contrast exists; ivhere, in comparison with the 
intelligence, wealth, and refinement of what are called the 

* Further details concerning the machinery by which the schools 
are managed and the taxes levied in Massachusetts will be found in an 
article in the Edinburgh Review for July, 1841, under the title of 
" Education in America," by George Combe. 
N 



i94 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap xii. 



higher classes, there is the most ignorance, iioverty, and crime 
among the lower/ Owing to the inherent vice and selfish- 
ness of their system, or their no-system, there is no country 
in which so little is effected, compared with their expendi- 
ture of means ; and what is done only tends to separate the 
different classes of society more and more widely from each 
other." 

There is a great difference between the influence of the 
voluntary principle when applied to the support of churches, 
and when applied to the support of schools for the poor. 
The main object of the Church is to provide means for 
securing the eternal salvation of the contributor and his 
family — a most momentous consideration to every reflecting 
man. It involves the selfish principles of his nature, as well 
as his affections and his sense of religious duty. The school 
for the poor, on the other hand, addresses chiefly his moral 
and religious sentiments, leaving his self-interest far in the 
rear. Experience shows that these emotions do not suffice 
to induce the rich to provide sufficiently for the physical 
wants of the poor, and, in consequence, Parliament has 
enacted poor-laws. Why, then, should we rely on them for 
providing for a not less clamant mental destitution ? 

The dogmas are obstructing educational progress in still 
another direction. They are depriving society of the full 
beneficial use of the Sunday. Their adherents insist that 
that day shall be devoted exclusively to hearing the dogmas 
preached, and to practising the solemnities they inculcate. 
One whole day of rest in seven is, to a toil-worn people, an 
inestimable boon, the necessity of which is clearly pro- 
claimed by the constitution of our organism ; and if judici- 
ously employed, it may be rendered a grand instrument of 
civilisation. If Nature is a Divine Institution, and if it 
teaches rules of practical conduct to men, what a precious 
day may Sunday become when it shall be devoted in an 



chap, xii.] THE DOGMAS AS PRACTICAL RULES. 195 

adequate measure to the exposition of these rules and of the 
wonderful structures and arrangements of Nature on which 
they are founded ! How gratifying to all our faculties, to 
the wants of which they are adapted by Divine wisdom and 
goodness ! And how fruitful in benefits to the mind and 
body of man S 

But under the thraldom of the dogmas all this instruc- 
tion, if given on Sundays, is regarded as sin, and society is 
excluded from the advantages of receiving it on that day — 
the only one set apart for mental improvement. The 
laborious inhabitants of our large towns who cannot travel 
in quest of the elements of this instruction and enjoyment 
have had these -brought to them by the philanthropy of a 
few enlightened men, in the form of parks, museums, and 
collections of works of art, all calculated not only to recreate 
a wearied body and brain, but to furnish captivating texts 
from which the most salutary and elevating practical lessons 
may be drawn. God has bestowed on us faculties of Melody 
and Time ; has endowed wood, steel, brass, and the air with 
qualities exquisitely fitting them to minister to their grati- 
fication, and has given us constructive talents enabling us to 
combine and apply these materials to the production of 
sounds capable of soothing us in sorrow, of inspiring us with 
gay and cheerful emotions, of rousing us to fervid action, 
or of lifting up our whole being in wrapt devotion to Him, 
the Giver of all good. 

If benevolent design can be proved to human apprehen- 
sion, here is evidence of it in abundance. Yet the adherents 
of the dogmas petition the Legislature, and successfully 
too, to shut up all these museums and collections of works 
'of art, and to oppose musical performances in the public 
parks on Sundays. They claim the whole of that day 
to themselves. But under their teaching and preaching 
there is scarcely any social progress. Their dogmas are 
stereotyped, and ever the same ; and I can bear testimony, 
N 2 



196 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. xn. 



that for fifty years I attended churches, and after the first 
four or five, when everything was new, I rarely received any 
addition to my knowledge ; and it is to maintain the in- 
terminable repetition of such doctrines that. God, His works, 
His wisdom, and His lessons, so prolifically abounding in 
Nature, must be thrust aside as profane, unprofitable, and 
unfitted for trie day set apart by society for rest, devotion, 
recreation, and instruction in things that are Divine ! 

If the dogmas were removed or modified, and if a more 
rational interpretation of the Bible were introduced, and 
the elements of science and the practical rules of conduct 
they dictate were taught in schools as God's revelations for 
our guidance, we should come prepared to hear the same 
sublime and soul-elevating instruction extended and en- 
forced every Sunday from the pulpit ; and it appears to me 
that the beneficial consequences to society would be in- 
calculably great. Progress would never cease ; monotony 
would be the fault of sloth and incapacity alone ; and no 
man of average mental endowments could truly say at 
the close of fifty years of such preaching, I "am no wiser 
and little better than I was at the beginning,' 3 

The unreasonableness of the oppression exercised by the 
adherents of the dogmas over society in regard to the enjoy- 
ment of these sources of improvement and happiness on 
Sundays is the more striking when we consider on what it 
is founded. From infancy, certain interpretations of the 
Fourth Commandment have been entwined in their minds 
with their religious emotions, and have become sacred in 
their estimation. Wholly unconscious that the sacred and 
religious character of the notions has been given to them by 
training, they regard them as infallible Divine truths. 

The inhabitants of Continental Europe, on the other 
hand, holding the same Commandment in their hands, put 
a different interpretation on the words, and, under the 
infiuence of their training, they regard that interpretation as 



CHAP, xil] THE DOGMAS AS PBACTICAL RULES. 197 



the sound one, and they act on it. Nevertheless, our dog- 
matists seem incapable of conceiving that these other 
opinions can possibly be true : and, not satisfied with 
unbounded liberty to act on their own impressions, they 
insist on forcing these on their countrymen ! They not 
only refuse to listen on Sundays to God's teaching in 
Xature, but they prohibit their equals from enjoying this 
unspeakable pleasure and advantage. 

Finally— hi all ages and countries, religious teachers 
have succeeded in persuading their own flocks that only their 
doctrines constitute true religion, are capable of supporting 
the mind in affliction, and are certain to lead to salvation ; 
and laymen, when trained from infancy under such impres- 
sions, really feel no religion in their souls, and cannot, even 
by their understandings, conceive any to exist that is 
calculated to produce these effects, except that which is 
embodied in their own tenets. When, therefore, a doctrine, 
be it that of election, or that of the fall of man, or any 
other (however uncertain in its foundation, and vehemently 
disputed by other sects), which has been woven into the 
mind of an individual as the only foundation of his hopes 
and consolations, happens to be subverted, he is really 
deprived, pro tempore, of his religion, and all its accompany- 
ing advantages and enjoyments ; for he has no religion 
unconnected with belief in the dogmas which have perished. 
Such believers are as sensitive to every doubt thrown on 
their faith as they w^ould be to an attack on their lives : and 
if they are not strong-minded, or are past the middle period 
of life, they only obey the law of their nature in feeling and 
thinking in this manner. 

"Were it likely that any of them would peruse these 
pages, I should be most unwilling to disturb their tran- 
quillity. On the contrary, I should refer them to the case 
of Rammohun Roy's mother, and encourage them to hold 
fast by the faith which gives them support and consolation. 



198 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[CHAP. XII. 



Though convinced that his Christian doctrines were true, 
she could not throw off the shackles of idolatrous customs. 
" Rammohun," she said to him, before she set out on her 
last pilgrimage to the Temple of Juggernath, "you are 
right ; but I am a weak woman, and am grown too old 
to give up these observances, which are a comfort to me." 
She maintained them with the most self-denying devotion. 
She would not allow a female servant to accompany her, or 
any other provision to be made for her comfort, or even 
support, on her journey; and when at Juggernath, she 
engaged in sweeping the temple of the idol. There she 
spent the remainder of her life — nearly a year, if not more ; 
and there she died. # 

When Melancthon paid a visit to his mother in her old 
age, she asked, "What am I to believe amidst so many 
different opinions of the present day ? " To which he 
answered, " Go on, believe and pray as you now do and 
have done before, and do not disturb yourself about the 
disputes and controversies of the times/'f 

* "Review of the Labours, Opinions, and Character of Rajah 
Rammohun Roy," by Lant Carpenter, LL.D. London, 1833. 

f " Lif e of Melancthon," by Francis Augustus Cox, A.M. 2nd 
Edition, p; 281. 



199 



CHAPTER XIII. 

Conclusion.— The Reformed Faith. 

In reference to the present condition and the future 
prospects of the Religion of Christendom, the fundamental 
point to be determined appears to me to be — Whether the 
world, as it now exists, is merely the wreck of a better 
system, or an Institution ? If it is the former, I leave to 
other hands the task of mending its disjointed parts, and 
educing from them whatever good they can be made to 
yield. If it is an Institution, then, as before remarked, # it 
will be our duty and our interest to regard it with respect 
as the design of its Author, to try to discover its plan, and 
to conform to its laws. With this view we may approach 
the study of it in the following order : — 

Human nature will constitute the central point of our 
investigations : because the adaptations of the world to our 
capacities, wants, and desires cannot be understood while 
the latter are unknown. If the views of man's nature 
stated above be well founded, physiology will form one 
grand source from which this information will be derived. 

If we find evidence that man is constitutionally a 
religious being, then we shall see a firm foundation in 
Nature for religion : and if we discover in him moral 
faculties, we shall perceive also an indestructible basis for 
morality. 

These two points being fixed, the next question will be 
— Whether Nature is constituted in such a relationship to 
our religious faculties as to inspire us intuitively with belief 

* See Chapter VI. , page 83. 



200 SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap, xiii- 

in the existence of a supernatural Power and Intelligence 
whom we call God ? If this question be answered in the 
affirmative, we shall then be led to view our own consti- 
tution and that of the external world as institutions pro- 
ceeding from this supernatural Power, and under this 
conviction our duties will become obvious.* 

If we desire to be healthy and to live long, we shall 
inquire into the conditions on which He has been pleased 
to dispense these advantages. If we desire to possess the 
necessaries, elegancies, and beneficial luxuries that contribute, 
by His appointment, to the enjoyment of life, we shall try 
to discover and to fulfil the further conditions on which He 
offers to us these advantages. If we wish to live in the 
society of intelligent, moral, religious, industrious, and 
happy men, we shall inquire into and fulfil the social 
duties on which He has made these boons to depend. 
Finally, if we desire to improve our whole being to its 
highest attainable point of perfection, and to raise our souls 
to communion with their Divine Author, we shall acquire 
and carry into practice the kind of knowledge, the morality, 
and the religion which he has rendered indispensable to our 
highest state of existence on earth. 

These are not Utopian and impracticable ideas : for, be it 
observed, if the world is an Institution, and man's faculties 
are adapted to it, there must be divinely appointed ways of 
gratifying these powers; and the corollary seems evident 
that man must be capable of finding them out, and com- 
plying with their requirements, when he shall seriously 
apply his endowments to this end. 

Our next aim should be to discover the qualities, agencies, 
and relations of natural objects. These exist and act under 
divinely imposed laws, which we call the Laws of Nature. 
As we cannot alter the qualities, suspend their action, or 



* See Chapter IV. , page 54. 



CHAP. XIII.] CONCLUSION.— THE REFORMED FAITH. 201 



prevent the consequences which have been attached to it, 
our chief duty in regard to them will be to investigate them, 
and to discover everything that can be known regarding 
them. This is the aim of scientific inquiry as now con- 
ducted : and the elucidation of the qualities and agencies of 
natural objects should continue to be pursued on purely 
scientific principles, for the sake of the knowledge which it 
affords, without, in the first instance, any attempt to apply 
it to moral and religious purposes. But the Divine origin 
of Xature should be constantly inculcated, and all our 
investigations should be conducted in a reverential spirit. 

In the next place, all the thoroughly ascertained facts 
concerning the qualities and agencies of Nature should be 
surveyed in their relations to man. When they are compared 
with his position, structure, wants, capacities, and desires, 
it will be seen that highly instructive rules of conduct are 
dictated to his understanding by Divine wisdom in these 
qualities, agencies, and relations. Examples of this fact are 
given in the preceding pages. 

Now, I respectfully maintain that these rules, when 
correctly inferred, are Divine Laws, because the things from 
which they are deduced are Divine Institutions, and 
because obedience to them is enforced by the consequences 
attached to them, which man can neither alter nor evade. 
Here, then, we have Divine law and Divine discipline 
combined. To render these rules moral in our minds, we 
require only to entwine them from infancy with our natural 
moral emotions ; and to render them religious, to present 
them habitually to our religious emotions as Divine, and 
train our whole faculties to reverence and obey them. 

If, by training, the doctrines of Calvinism quoted on 
pages 107 — 109, and the dancing evolutions of the Shakers 
described on page 126, have been invested with sacred 
qualities, have become religious truths and solemn cere- 
monies of Divine worship in the minds of large classes of 



202 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 



[chap. XIII. 



good and intelligent people, why should we doubt that rules 
which can be demonstrated to be Divine may be made to 
assume a moral and religious character, when proper means 
shall be used to communicate to them that sanctity which 
they inherently possess ? The low estimate which is now 
formed of them, as rules of prudence, but not of moral or 
religious obligation, appears to me to arise solely from the 
misdirection of our moral and religious emotions to other 
objects, and from the false light in which we have been 
taught to view man and the world. 

In the reformed faith, a distinction will be made between 
Religion and Theology. Religion will rest on the sentiments 
of Veneration, Hope, and Wonder as its basis, and will be 
recognised as emotional in its nature : its elements being 
reverence, admiration, and faith. It will be seen that by 
training, these emotions may be directed to almost any 
objects or doctrines : which, by being closely associated with 
them, assume a sacred or religious character. Hence, by 
such training, all truth conducive to human happiness may 
be rendered religious. 

Theology will be referred to the intellectual faculties and 
their organs as its basis : and these will not permit any 
objects or doctrines to be associated with the religious 
emotions which they cannot comprehend and trace to 
Divine authority. The intellect will not pretend to compre- 
hend the nature of God, but will recognise His existence, 
such of His attributes as it sees manifested, and also His 
will, as revealed in His works : and it will compose a theology 
out of these elements, will associate them with the religious 
emotions, and thus constitute a religion. Forms will be 
invented to give expression to this religion, and to teach it 
to the people. 

Morality will be recognised as resting on the sentiments 
of Benevolence and Conscientiousness as its peculiar basis, 
using the intellect to give it form in precepts and laws, and 



chap, xiil] CONCLUSION.— THE REFORMED FA JTH. 203 

to direct us in its practical applications. It will include the 
proper use of all the other faculties. It will not be viewed 
as dependent on religion for its foundation, but be regarded 
as a co-ordinate supreme tribunal, having authority in co- 
operation with the intellect and religious emotions, to direct 
all the faculties towards their proper objects — itself re- 
ceiving from the latter a sacred and religious character. 
There will then be no accepted religious duty at variance 
with morality, and no morality that is discordant with 
religion. 

The Desire of Perfection will be recognised as resting on 
Ideality, which, combined with the intellect, will prompt to 
constant improvement in all arts and sciences, and, combined 
with the moral and religious sentiments, will give an 
intense pleasure in elevating human nature, and applying 
ail its powers to their highest objects. 

"The higher life.'' under the reformed faith, will consist- 
in the zealous endeavour to improve every organ and 
faculty in ourselves and others, and to direct them to their 
highest uses. Intellect will investigate the means by which 
these ends can be accomplished, and it will recognise the 
order of the Divine government as its rule and guide. The 
moral and religious sentiments will sanctify and elevate the 
results of the researches of the intellect, and also the labour 
of the hands and the head in giving them practical effect. 
The grace or the goodwill of God will be recognised as 
pervading all objects and beings, inviting us to study and 
apply their qualities to their proper uses, with unhesitating 
faith that increase of knowledge and obedience will be 
accompanied by augmentation of happiness and holiness. 

It is in vain to object that hitherto natural religion has 
been barren. It has had no key to the real principles of 
the Divine government, and could not become practical. 
It may accomplish more when this key has been discovered. 

A great revolution in human perception, judgment, and 



204 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. xm. 



action will follow the general diffusion of the reformed 
faith. The selfishness, vices, and crimes through which 
individuals and nations at present too frequently seek to 
attain happiness will be recognised as follies as well as 
offences : and every individual will find that the most 
effectual way to promote his own well-being is that which 
likewise advances the improvement and enjoyment of his 
fellows. 

In regard to his future destiny : under the reformed 
faith he will rely with confidence and resignation on the 
goodness of that Divine Power which has called him into 
existence here, and bestowed on him so many admirable 
enjoyments. He will claim nothing as a right, but will hope 
all as a boon. 

Whose duty will it be to deduce, expound, and render 
sacred these Divine rules of conduct, and apply them to 
the promotion of human well-being, morality, and religion ? 
In my opinion, it will be that of the clergyman, the moral 
philosopher, and the teacher. 

What a glorious profession that of a clergyman will 
then become ! With an immovable and indestructible 
foundation for morality and religion ; with a knowledge 
of man's admirable capacities and high aspirations; with 
an understanding cleared of mists and prejudices, and 
alive to the perception of Divine power, wisdom, and 
goodness radiating from every object ; with an ear open to 
the precepts which that wisdom is teaching ; with benevolent, 
just, and reverential emotions excited to intensity by the 
contemplation of this assemblage of Divine gifts, and the 
wide world before him in which to apply all this know- 
ledge, and to expand these emotions in diffusing truth, 
happiness, and a spirit of obedience to God : he will occupy 
a position which even angels might envy. 

The priests, temples, churches, creeds, catechisms, and 
confessions, which fill such large and conspicuous positions 



CHAP, xiii.] CONCLUSION—THE REFORMED FAITH. 205 



in the history of all ages and nations, are the forms in 
which the moral and religious emotions have welled forth 
and embodied themselves on earth. Far, therefore, from 
looking on them with indifference, I see in them mani- 
festations of the highest human endowments, in many 
instances straying for want of light, but still holy in their 
aspirations ; and I rejoice in the religious fervour and 
agitation of our own day, as indicative of the heaving 
of these sublime emotions labouring to cast off the load 
of errors and superstitions which now oppresses them. 

Nor need the Bible form any obstacle to this con- 
summation. It appears to me that with far less violence 
than has been done to it in framing the Westminster 
Confession of Faith, a new creed could be formed, every 
point of which would harmonise with a sound Natural 
Religion, adding from the Scriptures doctrines beyond 
the reach of reason, but not contradicting it. From all I 
have learned of the progress of opinion among thinking 
men who have studied the subject, the conclusion is forced 
on me that within the next fifty years this must be done, 
otherwise Christianity, as now taught, will perish. Were 
this course followed, every Church would become a focus 
of Divine light, radiating blessings on humanity, and every 
school a vestibule to the Church. 

In the school, Physiology and the Laws of Life and 
Health,* and Social Economy, or an exposition of man's 
position and duties as the administrator of external nature, 
and of the natural laws which regulate his success or his 
failure in his trade, profession, or other employment, should 
form the first elements of scientific instruction. I have 
assisted in teaching these branches of knowledge to children 
from ten to fourteen years of age, and in leading their 
understandings to deduce from them rules of practical 



*See Appendix, No. V. 



206 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION. [chap. xiii. 



conduct, which they recognised as Divine injunctions or 
commands ; and I can testify that the interest and effect 
of the lessons was greatly enhanced by this appeal to their 
moral and religious emotions. 

The failure of most attempts to support continued 
interest in scientific lectures in Mechanics' Institutes is 
now generally recognised and lamented, but the cause of 
it has been little thought of. It appears to me discernible. 
Pure science addresses the intellectual faculties only. In 
the working classes in general these have not been culti- 
vated, either in their school instruction or practically in 
their trades. They come to the lecture -room, therefore, 
untrained to intellectual exertion, and many of them weary 
with toil ; and indifference to abstract science is the natural 
consequence of their condition. 

But their moral and religious emotions possess far 
greater power and activity than their intellectual faculties ; 
and, judging from the analogy of children, I should expect 
that they would listen with profound and sustained interest 
to courses of lectures based on clear scientific expositions 
of the structure, qualities, and modes of action of natural 
objects, accompanied by demonstrations of the rules of 
conduct which their Divine Author, through them, dictates 
to us for our guidance. By appeals to their moral and 
religious emotions, and a convincing elucidation of the 
practical bearing of these laws on their well-being and 
improvement, the lessons would probably become living 
fountains of instruction and enjoyment. 

If all this is not a dream, the day will come when 
these Divine rules for the guidance of our conduct, with 
the basis in science on which they are founded, will be 
taught in every school, preached from every pulpit, pro- 
mulgated by the press, enforced by the law, and supported 
by an overwhelming public opinion ; and then the in- 
capable and the ill-constituted in brain and body, whose 



chap, xm.] CONCLUSION. — THE REFORMED FAITH. 207 

actions now form the great afflictions of society, will be 
protected, restrained, and guided by social power, directed 
by benevolence, intelligence, and justice, and their crimes 
and sufferings will be circumscribed. Under the illumina- 
ting influence and discipline of the Divine law, Hell will 
probably appear unnecessary, Heaven will be realised on 
earth, and Man will prove himself by his conduct to be 
better fitted for an immortality of glory than he has ever 
hitherto been. 

Some religious sects rely on a millennium, in which 
human nature will appear in the perfection of its powers, 
and in possession of its highest enjoyments. This hope 
appears to me to spring from the insatiable desires of 
Ideality for perfection, and of Benevolence, Veneration, 
and Conscientiousness for the universal prevalence of 
happiness, truth, piety, and justice. The aspirations may 
be clothed in fanciful forms, but in themselves they are 
real ; and Nature appears to me to point in a similar 
direction. 

The opinion advocated in this work, that a Divine 
government is discernible in Nature, is gaining strength 
on public conviction. On page 13, I have cited a 
letter on this subject from Lord Palmerston to the Pres- 
bytery of Edinburgh ; and in a speech delivered by his 
Lordship in Manchester, in November, 1856, he is reported 
to have said: — "If a man were to enter a town of some 
foreign country where there were laws the violation of 
which was attended with pain, imprisonment, or, it may 
be, with death, would he not be deemed mad if he did 
not take the earliest opportunity to make himself ac- 
quainted with these enactments, so that he might avoid 
the penalties attached to their infringement ? Yet there 
are laws of Nature applicable to the daily pursuits of men, 
which, if not attended to, inflict bodily pain in the form 
of diseases, imprisonment in the shape of the loss of 



208 



SCIENCE AND RELIGION [chap, xm. 



corporeal powers, and even death, through the neglect of 
those sanitary conditions on which life depends. How 
important, then, it is that the working classes should be 
made aware of those natural laws and regulations which 
are indispensable to their own welfare, and to that of their 
families." 

His Royal Highness Prince Albert * is reported to have 
expressed the opinion, that " Man is approaching a more 
complete fulfilment of that great and sacred mission which 
he has to perform in this world. His reason being created 
after the image of God, he has to use it to discover the 
laws by which the Almighty governs His creation ; and, 
by making these laws his standard of action, to conquer 
Nature to his use— himself a Divine instrument. Science 
discovers these laws of power, motion, and transformation ; 
industry applies them to the raw matter which the earth 
yields us in abundance, but which becomes valuable only 
by knowledge ; art teaches us the immutable laws of 
beauty and symmetry, and gives to our productions forms 
in accordance with them." 

Again, in a speech delivered at Birmingham in Novem- 
ber, 1855, His Royal Highness is reported to have said : — 
" The study of the laws by which the Almighty governs 
the universe is our bounden duty. Of these laws our great 
academies and seats of education have, rather arbitrarily, 
selected only two spheres or groups (as I may call them) 
as essential parts of our national education — the laws 
which regulate quantities and proportions, which form the 
subject of mathematics ; and the laws regulating the ex- 
pression of our thoughts through the medium of language — 
that is to say, grammar, which finds its purest expression 
in the classical languages. 

" These laws are most important branches of knowledge : 



* At the Mansion House, 21st March, 1850. 



CHAP. XIII.] CONCLUSION.— THE REFORMED FAITH. 209 

their study trains and elevates the mind. But they are not 
the only ones ; there are others which we cannot disregard 
— which we cannot do without. There are, for instance 
the laws governing the human mind and its relations to 
the Divine Spirit — the subjects of logic and metaphysics. 
There are those which govern our bodily nature and its 
connection with the soul — the subjects of physiology and 
psychology ; those which govern human society and the 
relations between man and man — the subjects of politics, 
jurisprudence, and political economy ; and many others." 

In contemplating the endowments of man, the provision 
made in Nature for his happiness, and the order of God's 
providence for encouraging him to work out his own im- 
provement and elevation, the intelligent mind thrills with 
vivid emotions of love, gratitude, and admiration of their 
great Author. A " present Deity " is felt to be no longer 
a figure of speech or a flight of poetry, but a positive and 
operating reality. We not only feel that we " live, and 
move, and have our being" in God, but we become ac« 
quainted with the means through which His power, 
wisdom, and goodness affect us, and discover that we 
are invited, as His moral and intelligent creatures, to 
co-operate in the fulfilment of His designs. 

The beautiful exclamations of King David, " If I climb 
up into heaven, Thou art there ; if I go down to hell, Thoit 
art there also ; if I take the wings of the morning, and 
remain in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there also 
shall Thy hand lead me, and Thy right hand shall hold 
me," are felt to be expressions of a living truth ; and man 
takes his true station as the interpreter and administrator 
of Nature under the guidance of Nature's God. 



o 



APPENDIX. 



No. I. — On the Worship of the Shakers. 

(Referred to on p. 126.) 

As some readers may have a difficulty in believing that the 
dancing evolutions and singing of the Skakers, described 
on page 126, were really understood by themselves to consti- 
tute Divine worship, I present the following extracts from 
an account of their tenets, published by Seth Wells and 
Calvin Green, of Xew Lebanon, in the State of New York. 
It appears in " The Cyclopaedia of Religious Denomina- 
tions ;; : — 

" Concerning them mode of worship. This subject is 
generally greatly misunderstood. The people of this Society 
do not believe that any external performance whatever, with- 
out the sincere devotion of the heart, with all the feelings of 
the soul, in devotion and praise to the Creator of all their 
powers and faculties, can be any acceptable worship to Him 
who looks at the heart. But in a united assembly, a unity of 
exercise in acts of devotion to God is desirable ; for harmony 
is beautiful, and appears like the order of heaven. It will be 
difficult to describe all the various modes of exercise given in 
the worship of God at different times ; because the opera- 
tions of the Spirit are so various, that even the leaders are 
unable to tell beforehand what manner will be given by the 
Spirit in the next meeting. Yet, in a regular meeting, where 
nothing extraordinary appears, they sometimes exercise in a 
regular dance, while formed in straight lines, and sometimes 
in a regular march around the room, in harmony with regular 
o 2 



212 



APPENDIX. 



songs sung on the occasion. Shouting and clapping of hands, 
and many other operations, are frequently given, all which 
have a tendency to keep the assembly alive, with their hearts 
and all their senses and feelings devoted to the service of 
God. 

" Our benevolent Creator has given us hands and feet as 
well as tongues, which we are able to exercise in our own 
services. And where a people are united in one spirit, we 
know of no reason why a unity of exercise in the service of 
God should not be attained, so as to give the devotion of 
every active power of soul and body as a free-will offering to 
the God of all goodness who has given us these faculties. 
When the Israelites were delivered from their Egyptian 
bondage, they praised God with songs and dances. (See 
Exod. chap, xv.) This was figurative of the deliverance of 
spiritual Israel from the bondage of sin. This dancing before 
the Lord was predicted by the ancient prophets. (See Jer. 
chap, xxxi.) See also the account of David's dancing before 
the ark of the Lord. (See 2 Sam. vi. 14.) This is considered 
figurative of the spiritual ark of salvation, before which, 
according to the faith of God's true witnesses, thousands and 
millions will yet rejoice in the dance. See also the return of 
the prodigal son. (Luke xv, 25.) We notice these figurative 
representations and prophetic declarations as evidently point- 
ing to a day of greater and more glorious light which in 
those days was veiled in futurity, and if this is not the com- 
mencement of such a day, then where shall we look for it ? " 

This forms a striking example of the doctrine maintained 
in the text, that almost any ceremony may be rendered sacred 
and religious by being entwined from infancy with the re- 
ligious emotions. 

Xo. II.— Heaven and Hell. (Referred to on p. 155.) 
The following descriptions of Heaven and Hell are extracted 
from " A First Catechism for Children, to assist Parents and 



APPENDIX. 



213 



Teachers." By Joseph Hay, A.M.. Minister, Arbroath. New 
Edition. Edinburgh : William Oliphant and Sons; David 
Robertson, Glasgow; William Curry and Co., Dublin; and 
Hamilton, Adams and Co., London. Price One Penny. It 
is extensively taught to the young in schools in Scotland. 

HEAVEN. 

Where will the righteous go after they are judged ? Into 
life eternal. 

Why is this life called eternal ? Because it will last for 
ever. 

Will they never die any more ? No ; " there shall be no 
more death." 

Will they ever be sick in heaven ? ~No ; there shall be 
£< neither sorrow, nor crying, nor any more pain.'' — Rev. 
xxi. 4. 

Why will there be no more sickness nor death there? 
Because they will have no more sin. — Isaiah xxxiii. 24. 

Will they ever grow old in heaven ? No ; they will be 
like the angels of God. — Luke xx. 36 ; Mark xvi. 5. 



What company will they have in heaven? The 
company of Ged. of holy angels, and of all good men. — Heb. 
xii. ^2-^24. 

What will they be employed in ? They will serve God 
day and uight in His temple. — Rev. vii. 15. 

Will they ever be wearied in His service ? Xo ; it will 
be rest to them. — Heb. iv. 9. 

Will they be very happy in heaven ? Yes ; they will 
always sing the new song. — Rev. v. 9—10. 

What honour will they have there ? They will be kings 
and priests unto God. 

What glory will they have ? The glory of Christ. — Re v. 
in. 21. 



214 



APPENDIX. 



What will give light to them in heaven ? The glory of 
God and the Lamb.— Rev. xxi. 23. 

Will there be any night in heaven ? No ; " there will be 
no night there." — -Rev. xxii. 5. 

HELL. 

Where will the bad people go after they are judged ? 
Into everlasting punishment. 

With whom will they be punished in hell ? With the 
devil and his angels. 

What will they be tormented with ? With fire and brim- 
stone. — Rev. xxi. 8. 

Will they have any rest from their torments ? No ; they 
will have no rest day nor night. — Rev. xvi. 10. 

Will the pain of their torments be very great ? Yes ; they 
will gnaw their tongues with pain. — Rev. xv. 10. 

Will they cry out under their pain ? Yes ; with weeping, 
and wailing, and gnashing of teeth. — Matt. xiii. 50. 

Will they get any relief from these torments ? No : not 
a drop of water to cool their tongue. — Luke xv. 24-26. 

Will their torments ever come to an end ? No ; their 
worm dieth not, and their fire shall never be quenched, — 
Mark ix. 44. 

Will their torments make them any better ? No ; they 
will blaspheme God because of their pains and their sores, 
and not repent of their deeds. — Rev. xvi. 11. 

Will they have any light in hell ? No ; it will be the 
blackness of darkness for ever. — Jude 13. 

A girl of seven years of age, to whom this Catechism is 
taught, recently put this question to her mother ; " Mother," 
said she, " the Catechism says in one place that the bad people 
will have no light in hell, and in another place that they will 
be tormented with fire and brimstone. How can there be fire 
and no light P I always see light where there is fire." Her 
mother could not account for this anomaly, and gave an 



APPENDIX. 



215 



evasive answer. This indicated active reflective faculties in 
the child, and this Catechism supplied the materials, presented 
by the mother, and by many other evangelical Christians to 
their children, on which to exercise them ! The same persons 
denounce as infidel the proposal to instruct the young* in the 
objects and order of God's providence in Nature, which stand 
in the same relation to their intellects that wholesome food 
bears to their stomachs. 

The following account of sickness and death is given in 
the same Catechism : — 

SICKNESS AND DISEASE. 

Wherefore do sickness and disease come upon both old 
and young ? Because all have sinned. — Rom. v. 12. 

What is sickness to all who are not God's people*? It is 
punishment for their sin, and a warning to them to flee from it. 

What is it to God's people ? It is correction, to turn them 
from their sins. — Rev. iii. 19. 

What will afflictions do to God's people ? They will 
make them love and serve God more. — Ps. cxix. 67. 

What will they do to bad people ? Sometimes they will 
turn them to God. — 2 Chron. xxxiii. 12, 13. 

If they do not turn them to God, what will they do to 
them ? Make them more hardened against Him. — Isaiah i. 5, 

What should we do when we are sick ? We should seek 
God, and cry to Him for help. 

What help will He give us ] He will heal us of our sick- 
ness or prepare us for death. 

TEMPORAL DEATH. 

How did death come into the world ? By sin. 
Wherefore do all men die ? Because they have all sinned. 
Why do even the youngest infants die ? Because they 
sinned in Adam. — Rom. v. 14. 



216 



APPENDIX. 



What is death to bad people ? The beginning of eternal 
death. 

What is meant by the sting of death ? Its power of de- 
stroying men. — Rev. ii. 11. 

What is its sting p It is sin in us, unpardoned. 

To whom does death have its sting ? To them who die in 
their sin. 

What is death to good people ? The beginning of eternal 
life.— John xi. 25, 26. 

Why is there such a change on it to them ? Because 
Christ suffered it for them and took away its sting. — 1 Cor. 
xv. 57. 

What is the death of good people like ? It is like a sleep. 
— Acts vii. 60. 

Why is it called their last enemy ? Because, after it, they 
have no more sin nor suffering. 

How many of God's people have gone to heaven without 
dying ? Two : Enoch and Elijah. 

Will all who shall ever be in the world die ? No ; those 
who are on the earth when Christ comes shall not die, but be 
changed. — 1 Cor. xv. 51, 52. 

This is called religious instruction ; and for it the whole 
lessons for the guidance of human conduct, deducible from 
the Divine government of the world in Nature, are thrust 
aside and excluded from schools. 

No. III.— Note on Dr. M'Cosh's "Method of the 
Divine Government." 

The Rev. James M'Cosh, LL.D., in an elaborate work on 
" The Method of the Divine Government, Physical and 
Moral," has honoured my book " On the Constitution of 
Man " with a long note of criticisms, chiefly in condemnation 
of it. The following is his concluding paragraph : — " We 
have so far noticed this treatise because there is an 



APPENDIX. 



217 



air of extraordinary wisdom about it, which has made 
many regard it as superlatively profound. The author has 
seen and endeavoured to count the nice wheels of the machine, 
but has overlooked their relation to one another, and the 
moving power by which they have been set in motion. His 
views are about as profound as those of a factory-girl 
explaining, with looks of mysterious wisdom, to her com- 
panion who has just entered the work, the movements of 
some of the straps or wheels, telling her how to use them, and 
pointing out the danger of not attending to them. The 
information is all very good and useful, provided always that 
it be not hinted that in knowing the motion of these few 
wheels we know all about the machine, its end, and its mode 
of operation. 5 ' 

If I am the " factory-girl," it is to be inferred, I presume, 
that Dr. M'Cosh is the head engineer under God, and that, in 
his " Method of the Divine Government," he has elucidated 
far better and more extensively than I have done " all 
about the machine, its ends, its mode of operation, the moving 
power by which the wheels have been set in motion," and 
" their relations to one another." The reader wili judge of 
the success of his exposition when I add that he ignores the 
brain and the nervous system of man as instruments in the 
moral government of the world ! 

Again, Dr. M'Cosh says : " A very little observation suffices 
to discover the wonderful pains which have been taken with 
man in creating him at first, in endowing him with bodily 
organs and mental faculties, in opening to him sources of 
knowledge, and placing a multitude of resources at his com- 
mand. What high intelligence ! What far-sighted sagacity ! 
What fields, rich and fertile, placed around him, inviting to 
enter that he may dig for treasures and gather fruits ! It 
does seem strange that, in endowing man with such lofty 
powers, God should not have furnished him with faculties to 
communicate directly with his Maker and his Governor." 



218 



APPENDIX. 



(P. 41.) In my opinion, God communicates with man 
through Nature ; and in Chapter V. I have pointed out that 
while our faculties are adapted to the constitution of this 
world, and it to them, and are capable of discovering the 
existence of God, some of His attributes and His will, in so 
far as it relates to ourselves, nevertheless, He may so far 
transcend our faculties as to render us incapable of receiving 
more direct communications. Man can communicate with the 
dog, because they have some faculties in common, but he cannot 
communicate with the oyster, because its powers of compre- 
hension are too far below his faculties to render this possible. 

Dr. M' Cosh's view is different. " Now, 5 ' says he, " com- 
bine these two classes of facts, the apparent distance of God, 
and yet His nearness intimated in various ways, His seeming 
unconcern, and yet constant watchfulness ; and we see only 
one consistent conclusion which can be evolved : that God 
regards man as a criminal, from vjhom He must withdraw 
Himself, but whom He must not allow to escape." (P. 45.) 
If I rightly understand these words, they imply that the con- 
clusion at which Dr. M'Cosh has arrived from his study of 
" The Method of the Divine Government " is, that this world 
is a great prison, the human race a collection of criminals, 
and God the Head-Jailer and Executioner ! Whatever his 
meaning may be, his words grate harshly on my sentiment of 
Veneration when applied to the Supreme Being. Dr. 
M'Cosh was a minister of the Free Church of Scotland, and 
apparently he holds fast by its dogmas, and sees man and 
Nature only in the light in which they are represented in the 
Catechism quoted on page 213. 

No. IV.— Speech of Lord John Russell on Teaching 
Natural Theology in Common Schools. (Re- 
ferred to on p. 189.) 
Lord John Russell, in a speech delivered by him in the 
House of Commons on 4th April, 1853, in introducing a 



APPENDIX 



219 



scheme of National Education, is reported by The Times to 
have said, " The scheme " (of giving secular instruction in 
schools and omitting sectarian religion) "is developed by 
many of the writers on the subject, especially by Mr. Combe, 
whose name, no doubt, will be well remembered by the House. 
What he holds out is this — that very imperfect views are 
taken with respect to religious subjects ; that very often those 
rules which the Almighty has laid down for our conduct in 
this life, so far from being followed, are wilfully or blindly 
set at nought ; and that it is the business of the schoolmaster 
to teach those laws of social economy and of physiology by 
which the people of this kingdom may be better instructed in 
conducting themselves, so as to enable them to avoid that 
course of vice and misery into which too many of them fall. 
It will, however, be obvious to the House that this is a 
proposal different from what was the apparent proposal, as at 
first put forth, of the advocates of the secular system. The 
proposal, as it stands nakedly in the first declaration of their 
views, amounts to this — give exclusively secular instruction 
in the schools, and leave religion to be taught elsewhere by 
the ministers of religion. The second view of the subject, 
however, is this : there is a natural theology which should be 
taught in the schools, but Christianity should not be taught 
there. Now, that appears to me a view certainly more exten- 
sive, and undoubtedly far more dangerous, than that which 
the advocates of secular education first set out with. My 
belief is that the people of this country acted with a right 
instinct when, upon associating together and devoting their 
money for the purpose of education, they declared openly that 
there should be a religious training in the schools, and that 
that religious training should comprise all the great doctrines 
of Christianity." 

Lord John Russell commits an error if he means that 
while the advocates of a purely secular education proposed 
that Christianity should be taught by the clergy, or by 



220 



APPENDIX. 



teachers authorised by theru, in a separate school, I proposed 
to exclude such teaching altogether. In none of my published 
works does any such proposition appear, but the reverse. I 
have advocated teaching Christianity in separate schools, and 
I do so still ; because the people are Christian, and I should 
outrage every principle of religious liberty and common 
sense should I propose that persons whose highest hopes and 
fears are bound up in the Christian religion should in any 
way be precluded from having it taught to their children. 

The real state of the question is this. When purely 
secular instruction in one school, and sectarian religious in- 
struction in another, were proposed, the religious public 
objected, " In your secular schools you propose ' a godless 
education.' " When we answered, " Nature is a Divine insti- 
tution, and in these schools we shall teach God's natural laws 
established to regulate human well-being, leaving you to 
teach sectarian dogmas in a separate school," Lord John 
replied, " This is far more dangerous ! " More dangerous 
than what ? Apparently, from the context, than the purely 
secular instruction, which, however, many had denounced as 
" godless." Lord John appears to me, by implication, to 
deny that Nature is a Divine Institution, that it reveals rules 
for the guidance of human conduct, and that these rules are 
entitled to our reverence as Divine. 

[A great and beneficent change has been effected in the 
principles on which grants of public money are made to 
schools by the English Education Act of 1870. By the 
seventh clause it is enacted that " It shall not be required, as 
a condition of any child being admitted into or continuing in 
any public elementary school, that he shall attend or abstain 
from attending any Sunday-school, or any place of religious 
worship, or that he shall attend any religious observance, or 
any instruction in religious subjects in the school or else- 
where, from which observance or instruction he may be with- 
drawn by his parent, or that he shall, if withdrawn by his 



APPENDIX. 



221 



parent, attend the school on any day exclusively set apart for 
religious observance by the religious body to which his parent 
belongs : The time or times during which any religious 
observance or instruction in religious subjects is given at any 
meeting of the school shall be either at the beginning or at 
the end, or at the beginning and at the end of such meeting, 
and shall be inserted in a time-table to be approved by the 
Education Department, and to be kept permanently and con- 
spicuously affixed in every school-room; and any scholar may 
be withdrawn by his parent from such observance or instruc- 
tion without forfeiting any of the other benefits of the school : 
The school shall be open at all times to the inspection of any 
of Her Majesty's inspectors ; so, however, that it shall be no 
part of the duties of such inspector to inquire into any instruc- 
tion in religious subjects given at such school, or to examine 
any scholar therein in religious knowledge, or in any religious 
subject or book." And, by the 97th clause, it is enacted 
" that no parliamentary grant shall be made to any school in 
respect of any instruction in religious subjects." — Ed.] 

No. Y. — The Teaching of Physiology in Common 
Schools. (Referred to on p. 205.) 

Medical Opinion on the Importance of Teaching Physiology 
and the Laws of Health in Coommn Schools. 

" Our opinion having been requested as to the advantage of 
making the Elements of Human Physiology, or a general 
knowledge of the laws of health, a part of the education of 
youth, we. the undersigned, have no hesitation in giving it 
strongly in the affirmative. We are satisfied that much of the 
sickness from which the working classes at present suffer 
might be avoided ; and we know that the best directed efforts 
to benefit them by medical treatment are often greatly im- 
peded, and sometimes entirely frustrated, by their ignorance 
and their neglect of the conditions upon which health neces- 



222 



APPENDIX. 



sarily depends. We are, therefore, of opinion that it would 
greatly teed to prevent sickness and to promote soundness of 
body and mind were the Elements of Physiology, in its appli- 
cation to the preservation of health, made a part of general 
education ; and we are convinced that such instruction may 
be rendered most interesting to the young, and may be 
communicated to them with the utmost facility and pro- 
priety in the ordinary schools, by properly instructed school- 
masters.' 5 (Subscribed by upwards of sixty eminent physicians 
and surgeons.) 



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Flora's Feast. A Masque of Flowers. Penned and Pictured by Walter 

Crane. With 40 Pages in Colours. 5s. 
Football, The Rugby Union Game. Edited by Rev. F. Marshall. 

Illustrated. 7s. 6d. 
Fraser, John Drummond. By Philalethes. A Story of Jesuit 

Intrigue in the Church of England. 5s. 
Garden Flowers, Familiar. By Shirley Hibberd. With Coloured 

Plates by F. E. Hulme, F.L.S. Complete in Five Series. 12s. 6d. each. 
Gardening, Cassell's Popular. Illustrated. Four Vols. 5s. each. 
George Saxon, The Reputation of. By Morley Roberts. 5s. 
Gleanings from Popular Authors. Two Vols. With Original Illus- 

trations. 4to, 9s. each. Two Vols, in One, 15s. 
Gulliver's Travels. With 83 Engravings by Morten. Cheap Edition, 

Cloth, 3s. 6d. ; cloth gilt, 5s. 
Gun and its Development, The. By W. W. Greener. With 500 

Illustrations. 10s. 6d. 
Health at School. By Clement Dukes, M.D., B.S. 7s. 6d. 
Heavens, The Story of the. By Sir Robert Stawell Ball, LL.D., 

F.R.S., F.R.A.S. With Coloured Plates. Popular Edition. 12s. 6d. 
Heroes of Britain in Peace and War. With 300 Original Illus- 
trations. Two Vols., 3s. 6d. each ; or One Vol., 7s. 6d. 
History, A Foot-note to. Eight Years of Trouble in Samoa. By 

Robert Louis Stevenson. 6s. 
Historic Houses of the United Kingdom. Profusely Illustrated. 10s. 6d. 
Home L:fe of the Ancient Greeks, The. Translated by Alice 

Zimmern. Illustrated. 7s. 6d. 
Horse, The Book of the. By Samuel Sidney. Thoroughly Revised 

and brought up to date by James Sinclair and W. C. A. Blf.w. With 

17 Full-page Collotype Plates of Celebrated Horses of the Day, and 

numerous other Illustrations. Cloth, 15s. 
Houghton, Lord : The Life, Letters, and Friendships of Richard 

Monckton Milnes, First Lord Houghton. By T. Wemvss 
. Reid. In Two Vols., with Two Portraits. 32s. 
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Four Vols, in Two, half morocco, 25s. 
Hygiene and Public Health. By B. Arthur Whitelegge, M.D. 7s. 6d. 



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India, Cassell's History of. By James Grant. With about 400 
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In-door Amusements, Card Games, and Fireside Fun, Cassell's 
Book of. Cheap Edition. 2s. 

Into the Unknown: A Romance of South Africa. By Lawrence 
Fletcher. 4s. 

Iron Pirate, The. A Plain Tale of Strange Happenings on the Sea. By 

Max Pemberton. Illustrated. 5s. 
Island Nights' Entertainments. By R. L. Stevenson. Illustrated, 6s. 
Italy from the Fall of Napoleon I. in 1815 to 1890. By J. W. Probyn. 

New and Cheaper Edition. 3s. 6d. 
Joy and Health. By Martellius. 3s. 6d. Edition de Luxe^ 7s. 6d. 
Kennel Guide, The Practical. By Dr. Gordon Stables, is. 
" La Bella," and Others. Being Certain Stories Recollected by Egerton 

Castle, Author of " Consequences." 6s. 
Ladies' Physician, The. By a London Physician. 6s. 
Lady's Dressing-room, The. Translated rom the French of Baroness 

Staffe by Lady Colin Campbell. 3s. 6d. 
Leona. By Mrs. Molesworth. 6s. 

Letters, the Highway of, and its Echoes of Famous Footsteps. 

By Thomas Archer. Illustrated. 10s. 6d. 
Letts's Diaries and other Time-saving Publications published 

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Little Minister, The. By J. M. Barrie. Illustrated Edition. 6s. 
Locomotive Engine, The Biography of a. By Henry Frith. 5s. 
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and Second Series. Two Vols., each with Portrait, 32s. each. 
London, Greater. By Edward Walford. Two Vols. With about 

400 Illustrations, gs. each. 
London, Old and New. Six Vols., each containing about 200 

Illustrations and Maps. Cloth, gs. each. 
London Street Arabs. By Mrs. H. M. Stanley. Illustrated, 5s. 
Medicine Lady, The. By L. T. Meade. In One Vol., 6s. 
Medicine, Manuals for Students of. (A List forwarded post free.) 
Modern Europe^ A History of. By C. A. Fyffe, M.A. Complete in 

Three Vols., with full-page Illustrations, 7s. 6d. each. 
Mount Desolation. An Australian Romance. By W. Carlton D awe. 5s. 
Music, Illustrated History of. By Emil Naumann. Edited by the 

Rev. Sir F. A. Gore Ouseley, Bart. Illustrated. Two Vols. 31s. 6d. 
Musical and Dramatic Copyright, The Law of. By Edward 

Cutler, Thomas Eustace Smith, and Frederic E. Weatherly, 

Barristers-at-Law. 3s. 6d. 
Napier, Life and Letters of the Rt. Hon. Sir Joseph, Bart., LL.D., 

&c. By A. C. Ewald, F.S.A. New and Revised Edition. 7s. 6d. 

National Library, Cassell's. In Volumes. Paper covers, 3d. ; cloth, 
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Natural History, Cassell's Concise. By E. Perceval Wright, 
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Natural History, Cassell's New. Edited by Prof. P. Martin 
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Nature's Wonder Workers. By Kate R. Lovell. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 
New England Boyhood, A. By Edward E. Hale. 3s. 6d. 
Nursing for the Home and for the Hospital, A Handbook of. 

By Catherine J. Wood. Cheap Edition, is. 6d. ; cloth, 2s. 
Nursing of Sick Children, A Handbook for the. By Catherine 

J. Wood. 2s. 6d. 
O'Driscoll's Weird, and other Stories. By A. Werner. 5s. 
Odyssey, The Modern ; or, Ulysses up to Date. Cloth gilt, 10s. 6d. 
Ohio, The New. A Story of East and West. By Edward E. Hale. 6s. 
Oil Painting, A Manual of. By the Hon. John Collier. 2s. 6d. 
Our Own Country. Six Vols. With 1,200 Illustrations. 7s. 6d. each. 
Out of the Jaws of Death. By Frank Barrett. In One Vol., 6s. 
Painting, The English School of. Cheap Edition. 3s. 6d. 
Painting, Practical Guides to. With Coloured Plates :— 



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Animal Painting. 5s. 
China Painting. 5s. 
Figure Painting. 7s. 6d. 
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Tree Painting. 5s. 
Water-Colour Painting. 5s. 
Neutral Tint. 5s. 
Sepia, in Two Vols., 3s. each ; or 

in One Vol., 5s. 
Flowers, and How to Paint 

Them. 5s. 



Paris, Old and New. A Narrative of its History, its People, and its 
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Peoples of the World, The. In Six Vols. By Dr. Robert Brown. 

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Perfect Gentleman, The. By the Rev. A. Smythe-Palmer, D.D. 3s. 6d. 
Phillips, Watts, Artist and Playwright. By Miss E. Watts 

Phillips. With 32 Plates. 10s. 6d. 
Photography for Amateurs. By T. C. Hepworth. Enlarged and 

Revised Edition. Illustrated, is. ; or cloth, is. 6d. 
Phrase and Fable, Dictionary of. By the Rev. Dr. Brewer. Cheap 

Edition, Enlarged, cloth, 3s. 6d. ; or with leather back, 4s. 6d. 
Picturesque America. Complete in Four Vols., with 48 Exquisite Steel 

Plates and about 800 Original Wood Engravings. £2 2s. each. 
Picturesque Canada. With 600 Original Illustrations. Two Vols. £6 6s. 

the Set. 

Picturesque Europe. Complete in_ Five Vols. Each containing 

13 Exquisite Steel Plates, from Original Drawings, and nearly 200 

Original Illustrations. Cloth, £21; half-morocco, £31 10s. ; morocco 

gilt, £52 10s. Popular Edition. In Five Vols., 18s. each. 
Picturesque Mediterranean, The. With Magnificent Original Illustrations 

by the leading Artists of the Day. Complete in Two Vo>s. £2 2s. each. 
Pigeon Keeper, The Practical. By Lewis Wright. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 
Pigeons, The Book of. By Robert Fulton. Edited and Arranged by 

L. Wright. With 50 Coloured Plates, 31s. 6d. ; half-morocco, £2 2s. 
Pity and of Death, The Book of. By Pierre Loti. Translated by 

T. P. O'Connor, M.P. 5s. 
Planet, The Story of Our. By T. G. Bonney, D.Sc, LL.D., F.R.S., 

F.S.A.., F.G.S. With Six Coloured Plates and Maps and about 100 

Illustrations. 31s. 6d. 
Playthings and Parodies. Short Stories by Barry Pain. 5s. 
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each containing 36 Cabinet Photographs of Eminent Men and Womea 

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Poultry Keeper, The Practical. By L. Wright. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 
Poultry, The Book of. By Lewis Wright. Popular Edition. 10s. 6d. 
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Coloured Plates. New and R evised Edition. Cloth, 31s. 6d. 
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Dead Man's Roek. 
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The Bme Pavilions. 



Ihe Astonishing History of Troy Town. 
" I Siw Three Ships," and other Winter's Tales. 
Noughts and Crosses. 

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Queen Summer ; or, The Tourney of the Lily and the Rose. 

Pages of Designs in Colours by Walter Crane. 6s. 
Queen Victoria, The Life and Times of. By Robert Wilson. Com- 
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Quickening of Caliban, The. A Modern Story of Evolution. By J. 

Compton Rickett. 5s. 
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Raffles Haw, The Doings of. By A. Conan Doyle. Neiv Edition. 5s. 
Railways, Our. Their Development, Enterprise, Incident, and Romance. 

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R.AILWAY. 

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Metzerott, Shoemaker. By Kai 

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David Todd. By David Maclure 
The Admirable Lady Biddy Fane. 

By Frank Barrett. 
Commodore Jlnk. By G. Manville 

Fenn. 

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ENCE Warden. 

The Man with a Thumb. By Bar- 
clay North. 

By Right not Law. By R. 
Sherard. 

Within Sound of the Weir. By 
Thomas St. E. Hake. 

Under a Strange Mask. By Frank 
Barrett. 

The Coombsberrow Mystery. By 
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A Queer Race. By W. Westall. 

Captain Trafalgar. By Westall 
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Jack Gordon, Knight Errant, 
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The yoke of the Thorah. By 

Sidney Luska. 
Who is John noman? By Charles 

Henry Beckett. 
The Tragedy of Brinkwater. By 

Martha l. moodey. 
An American Penman. By Julian 

Hawthorne. 
Section 558; or, the Fatal Letter. 

By TULIAN HAWTHORNE. 

The Brown Stone boy. By w. H. 
Bishop. 

A Tragic Mystery. By Julian 

Hawthorne. 
The Great Bank robbery. By 
Julian Hawthorne. 



Rivers of Great Britain : Descriptive, Historical, Pictorial. 

The Royal River : The Thames, from Source to Sea. Popular 
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Romance, The World of. Illustrated. Cloth, gs. 

Russo-Turkish War, Cassell's History of. With about 500 Illus- 
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Salisbury Parliament, A Diary of the. By H. W. Lucy. Illustrated 
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Science for All. Edited by Dr. Robert Brown. Revised Edition' 

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Shadow of a Song-, The. A Novel. By Cecil Harley. 5s. 
Shaftesbury, The Seventh Earl of, K.G., The Life and Work of. By 

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Shakspere, The International. Edition de Lnxe. 

" King Henry VIII." Illustrated by Sir James Linton, P.R.I. 
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"Othello." Illustrated by Frank Dicksee, R. A. £3 10s. 

"King Henry IV." Illustrated by Eduard Grutzner. £3 10s. 

"As You Like It." Illustrated by Emile Bayard. £3 10s. 

"Romeo and Juliet." Illustrated by F. Dicksee, R.A. Is now out 
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Shakspere, The Leopold. With 400 Illustrations. Cheap Edition. 

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Smuggling Days and Smuggling Ways. By Commander the Hon. 

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Snare of the Fowler, The. By Mrs. Alexander. In One Vol., 6s. 

Social Welfare, Subjects of. By Rt. Hon. Lord Playfair, K.C.B. 7s. 6d. 

Social England. A Record of the Progress of the people in Religion, 
Laws, Learning, Arts, Science, Literature, and Manners, from the 
Earliest Times to the Present Day. By various writers. Edited by 

H. D. Traill, D.C.L. Vol. I.— From the Earliest Times to the 
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Sports and Pastimes, Cassell's Complete Book of. Cheap Edition. 

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Squire, The. Bv Mrs. Parr. In One Vol., 6s. 
Standard Library, Cassell's. Cloth, 2s. each. 



Adventures of Mr. 

Ledbury. 
Ivanhoe. 
Oliver Twist. 
Selections from Hood's 

Works. 
Longfellow's Prose 

Works. 
Sense and Sensibility. 
Lytton's Plays. 
Tales, Poems, and 

Sketches. Bret Harte. 
Martin Chuzzlewir 

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The Prince of the 

House of David. 
Sheridan's Plays. 
Uncle Tom's Cabin. 
Deerslayer. 
Pome and the Early 

Christians. 
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garet Lyndsay. 
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Star-Land. By Sir R. S. Ball, LL.D., &c. Illustrated. 6s. 
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Shirley. 
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Charles O'Malley. 
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The King's Own. 
People I have Met. 
The Pathfinder. 
Evelina. 
Scott's Poems. 
Last of the Barons. 



Jack Hint on. 
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Handy Andy. 
Scarlet Letter. 
Pickwick (Two Vols.L 
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Pienzi. 

Old Curiositv Shop. 
Heart of Midlothian. 
Last Daj^s of Pompeii. 
American Humour. 
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Story of Francis Cludde, The. By Stanley J. Weyman. 6s. 

Story Poems. For Young and Old. Edited by E. Davenport. 3s. 6d. 

Successful Life, The. By An Elder Brother. 3s. 6d. 

Sun, The. By Sir Robert Stawell Ball, LL.D., F.R.S., F.R.A.S. 
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The Temptation of Dulee Car- I On Stronger Wings. By Edith 
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Sybil Knox: a Story of To-day. By Edward E. Hale. ^ 6s. 

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Treasure Island. By Robert 

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King- Solomon's Mines. By H. 
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fBtblES att& iteUginits Works. 

Bible Biographies. Illustrated. 2S. 6d. each. 

The oior 01 mioses and Joshua. By the Rev. Prebendary Gordon 
Calthrop. 

The t»t ry of Judges. By the Rev. J. Wycliff Gedge. 
The St* ry of S-tul and Samuel. By the Rev. D. C. TOVEY. 
The Sto y of avid. By the Rev. J. Wilde. 

The Story of Jo^epa. Its Lessons for To-Day . By GEORGE BAINTON. 
The Story of J sus. In Verse. By J. R. Macduff, D D. 

Bible, Cassell's Illustrated Family. With 900 Illustrations. Leather, 
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Bible Educator, The. Edited by the Very Rev. Dean Plumptre, D.D., 
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Bible Student i 1 the British Museum, The. By the Rev. J. G. 
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Biblewomen and Nurses. Yearly Volume. Illustrated. 3s. 

Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. Illustrated throughout. Cloth, 3s. 6d. ; 
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Child's Bible, The. With 200 Illustrations. 150^ Thousand. 7s. 6d. 

Child's Life of Christ, The. W T ith 200 Illustrations. 7s. 6d. 

"Come, ye Children." Illustrated. By Rev. Benjamin Waugh. 5s. 

Conquests of the Cross. Illustrated. In 3 Vols. gs. each. 

Dore Bible. With 238 Illustrations by Gustave Dor6. Small folio, 
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Early Days of. Christianity, The. By the Ven. Archdeacon Farrar, 
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Popular Edition. _ Complete in One Volume, cloth, 6s. ; cloth, gilt 
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Family Prayer- Book, The. Edited by Rev. Canon Garbett, M.A., 
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Gleanings after Harvest. Studies and Sketches by the Rev. John R. 
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"Graven in the Rock." By the Rev. Dr. Samuel Kinns, F.R.A.S., 
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"Heart Chords." A Series of Works by Eminent Divines. Bound in 
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MY BIBLE. By the Riyht Rev. W. BOYD 
Carpenter, Bishop of Ripon. 

MY FATHER. By the Right Rev. ASH- 
TON OXENDEN, late Bishop of Mont- 
real. 

MY WORK FOR GOD. By the Right 

Rev. Bishop COTTERILL. 
MY OBJECT IN Life. By the Ven. 

Archdeacon FARRAR, D.D. 
MY ASPIRATIONS. By the Rev. G. 

MATHESON, D.D. 
MY EMOTIONAL LIFE. By the Rev. 

Preb. CHADWiCK, D.D. 
MY BODY. By the Rev. Prof. W. G. 
BLAIKIE, D.D. 



MY Growth in Divine Life. By the 

Rev. Preb. REYNOLDS, M.A. 
MY SOUL. By the Rev. P. B. POWER, 
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MY HEREAFTER. Bv the Very Rev. 
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My Walk with God. By the Very 
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MY SOURCES OF STRENGTH. By the 
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Helps to Belief. A Series of Helpful Manuals on the Religious 
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Canon of Worcester. Cloth, is. each. 
Creation By Dr. H. Goodwin, the late 



Lord Bishop of Carlisle. 
The Divinity of our Lord. By 

the Lord B shop ot Derry. 
The Morality of the Old Testa- 
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Holy Land and the Bible, The. By the Rev. C. Geikie, D.D., LL.D, 
(Edin.). Two Vols., 24s. Illustrated Edition, One Vol., 21s. 



MIRACLES. By the Rev. Brownlow 

Maitland, M.A. 
Prayer. By the Rev. T. Teignmouth 

Shore, M.A. 
THE ATONEMENT. By William Connor 
Magee, D.D., Late Archbishop of 
York. 



3 b. 8.93 



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Lectures on Christianity and Socialism. By the Right Rev. Alfred 
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Life of Christ, The. By the Yen. Archdeacon Farrar,' D.D., F.R.S. 

Library Edition. Two Vols. Cloth, 24s. ; morocco, 42s. Cheap 
Illustrated Edition. Cloth, 7s. 6d. ; cloth, full gilt, gilt edges, 
10s. 6d. Popular Edition, in One Vol., 8vo, cloth, 6s. ; cloth, 
gilt edges, 7s. 6d. ; Persian morocco, gilt edges, 10s. 6d. ; tree-calf, 15s. 

Moses and Geology ; or, The Harmony of the Bible with Science. 
By the Rev. Samuel Kinns, Ph.D., F.R.A.S. Illustrated. New 
Edition on Larger and Superior Paper. 8s. 6d. 

New Light on the Bible and the Holy Land. By B. T. A. Evetts, 
M.A. Illustrated. 21s. 

New Testament Commentary for English Readers, The. Edited 
by the Rt. Rev. C. J. Ellicott, D.D., Lord Bishop of Gloucester 
and Bristol. In Three Volumes. 21s. each. Vol. I. — The Four Gospels. 
Vol. II. — The Acts, Romans, Corinthians, Galatians. Vol. III. — The 
remaining Books of the New Testament. 

New Testament Commentary. Edited by Bishop Ellicott. Handy 
Volume Edition. St. Matthew, 3s. 6d. St. Mark, 3s. St. Luke, 
3s. 6d. St. John, 3s. 6d. The Acts of the Apostles, 3s. 6d. Romans, 
2S. 6d. Corinthians I. and II., 3s. Galatians, Ephesians, and Philip- 
pians, 3s. Colossians, Thessalonians, and Timothy, 3s. Titus, 
Philemon, Hebrews, and James, 3s. Peter, Jude, and John, 3s. 
The Revelation, 3s. An Introduction to the New Testament, 3s. 6d. 

Old Testament Commentary for English Readers, The. Edited 
by the Right Rev. C. J. Ellicott, D.D., Lord Bishop of Gloucester 
and Bristol. Complete in Five Vols. 21s. each. Vol. I. — Genesis to Num- 
bers. Vol. II. — Deuteronomy to Samuel II. Vol. III. — Kings I. to 
Esther. Vol. IV. — Job to Isaiah. Vol. V. —Jeremiah to Malachi. 

Old Testament Commentary. Edited by Bishop Ellicott. Handy 
Volume Edition. Genesis, 3s. 6d. Exodus, 3s. Leviticus, 3s. 
Numbers, 2s. 6d. Deuteronomy, 2s. 6d. 

Old and New Testaments, Plain Introductions to the Books of the. 
Containing Contributions by many Eminent Divines. In Two Volumes, 
3s. 6d. each. 

Protestantism, The History of. By the Rev. J. A. Wylie, LL.D. 

Containing upwards of 600 Original Illustrations. Three Vols. gs. each. 
Quiver Yearly Volume, The. With about 600 Original Illustrations. 

7s. 6d. 

Religion, The Dictionary of. By the Rev. W. Benham, B.D. 

Cheap Editio7i. 10s. 6d. 
St. George for England ; and other Sermons preached to Children. By 

the Rev. T. Teignmouth Shore, M.A., Canon of Worcester. 5s. 
St. Paul, The Life and Work of. By the Ven. Archdeacon Farrar, 

D.D., F.R.S., Chaplain-in-Ordinary to the Queen. Library Edition. 

Two Vols., cloth, 24s. ; calf, 42s. Illustrated Edition, complete 

in One Volume, with about 300 Illustrations, £1 is. ; morocco, £2 2s. 

Popular Edition. One Volume, 8vo, cloth, 6s.; cloth, gilt edges, 

7s. 6d. ; Persian morocco, 10s. 6d. ; tree-calf, 15s. 
Shall We KnowOne Another in Heaven? By the Rt Rev, J. C. 

Ryle, D.D., Bishop of Liverpool. Cheap Edition. Paper covers, 6d. 
Signa Christi. By the Rev. James Aitchison. 5 = . 
"Sunda}'," Its Origin, History, and Present Obligation. By the. 

Ven. Archdeacon Hessey, D.C.L. Fijth Edition. 7s. 6d. 
Twilight of Life, The. Words of Counsel and Comfort for the 

Aged. By the Rev. John Ellerton, M.A. is. 6d. 



Selections from Cassell § Company's Publications. 



(Bimcatitfttal Wtavks anir ^tittr^itts' JHamtals. 

Agricultural Text-Books, Cassell's. (The " Downton " Series.) Edited 
by John Wrightson, Professor of Agriculture. Fully Illustrated, 
2s. 6d. each. Farm Crops. — By Prof. Wrightson. Soils and 
Manures.— By J. M. H. Munro, D.Sc. (London), F.I.C, F.C.S. 
Live Stock. — By Prof. Wrightson. 

Alphabet, Cassell's Pictorial. 3s. 6d. 

Arithmetics, The Modern School. By George Ricks, B.Sc. Lond. 

With Test Cards. (List on application.) 
Atlas, Cassell's Popular. Containing 24 Coloured Maps. 2s. 6d. 
Book-Keeping. By Theodore Jones. For Schools, 2s. ; cloth, 3s. 

For the Million, 2s. ; cloth, 3s. Books for Jones's System, 2s. 
British Empire Map of the World. New Map for Schools and 

Institutes. By G. R. Parkin and J. G. Bartholomew, F.R. G.S. 

Mounted on cloth, varnished, and with Rollers. 25s. 
Broadacre Farm; or, Lessons in Our Laws. By H. F. Lester. 

Illustrated. Two Vols. , is. 6d. each. 
Chemistry, The Public School. By J. H. Anderson, M.A. 2s. 6d. 
Cookery for Schools. By Lizzie Heritage. 6d. 

Drawing Copies, Cassell's Modern School Freehand. First Grade, 

is. ; Second Grade, 2s. 
Drawing Copies, Cassell's " New Standard." Complete in Fourteen 

Books. 2d., 3d., and 4d. each. 
Energy and Motion. By William Paice, M.A. Illustrated, is. 6d. 
Euclid, Cassell's. Edited by Prof. Wallace, M.A. is. 
Euclid, The First Four Books of. New Edition. In paper, 6d. ; cloth, gd. 
Experimental Geometry. By Paul Bert. Illustrated, is. 6d. 
French, Cassell's Lessons in. New and Revised Edition. Parts I. 

and II., each 2s. 6d. ; complete, 4s. 6d. Key, is. 6d. 
French-English and English-French Dictionary. Entirely New 

and Enlarged Edition. 1,150 pages, 8vo, cloth, 3s. 6d. 
French Reader, Cassell's Public School. By G. S. Conrad. 2s. 6d. 
Gaudeamus. Songs for Colleges and Schools. Edited by John Farmer. 

5s. Words only, paper covers, 6d. ; cloth, gd. 
German Dictionary, Cassell's New (German-English, English- 
German). Cheap Edition. Cloth, 3s. 6d. 
Hand-and-Eye Training. By G. Ricks, B.Sc. 2 Vols., with 16 Coloured 

Plates in each Vol. Cr. 4to, 6s. each. Cards for Class Use, 5 sets, is. each. 
Historical Cartoons, Cassell's Coloured. Size 45 in. x 35 in., 2S. 

each. Mounted on canvas and varnished, with rollers, 5s. each. 
Historical Course for Schools, Cassell's. Illustrated throughout. 

I. — Stories from English History, is. II. — The Simple Outline of 

English History, is. 3d. III. — The Class History of England, 2s. 6d. 
Italian Grammar, The Elements of, with Exercises. In One 

Volume. 3s. 6d. 

Latin Dictionary, Cassell's New. (Latin-English and English- Latin.) 
Revised by J. R. V. Marchant, M.A., and J. F. Charles, B.A. 
Cloth, 3s. 6d. 

Latin Primer, The First. By Prof. Postgate. is. 

Latin Primer, The New. By Prof. J. P. Postgate. Crown 8vo, 2s. 6d. 

Latin Prose for Lower Forms. By M. A. Bayfield, M.A. 2s. 6d. 

Laundry Work (How to Teach It). By Mrs. E. Lord. 6d. 

Laws of Every-Day Life. By H. O. Arnold-Forster, M.P. is. 6d. 

Special Edition on Green Paper for Persons with Weak Eyesight. 2s. 
Little Folks' History of England. Illustrated, is. 6d. 
Making of the Home, The. By Mrs. Samuel A. Barnett. is. 6d. 
Marlborough Books: — Arithmetic Examples, 3s. French Exercises, 

3s. 6d. French Grammar, 2S. 6d. German do., 3s. 6d. 
Mechanics and Machine Design, Numerical Examples in Practical. 

By R. G. Blaine, M.E. New and Revised Edition. With 69 Diagrams. 

Cloth, 2s. 6d. 



Selections from Cassell $ Company's Publications. 



Mechanics for Young Beginners, A First Book of. By the Rev. 

J. G. Easton, M.A. 4s. 6d. 
Natural History Coloured Wall Sheets, Cassell's New. 18 

Subjects. Size 39 by in. Mounted on rollers and varnished. 3s. each. 
Object Lessons from Nature. By Prof. L. C. Miall, F.L.S. Fully 

Illustrated. New and Enlarged Edition. Two Vols., is. 6d. each ; or 

in One Vol., 3s. 

Physiology for Schools. By A. T. Schofield, M.D., M.R.C.S.,&c 
Illustrated. Cloth, is. gd. ; Three Parts, paper covers, 5d. each ; or 
cloth limp, 6d. each. 

Poetry Readers, Cassell's New. Illustrated. 12 Books, id. each; or 
complete in one Vol., cloth, is. 6d. 

Popular Educator, Cassell's NEW. With Revised Text, New Maps, 
New Coloured Plates, New Type, &c. In 8 Vols., 5s. each; or in 
Four Vols., half-morocco, 50s. the set. 

Readers, Cassell's "Higher Class." {List on application.') 

Readers, Cassell's Readable. Illustrated. {List on application.) 

Readers for Infant Schools, Coloured. Three Books. 4d. each. 

Reader, The Citizen. By H. O. Arnold-Forster, M.P. Illustrated, 
is. 6d. Also a Scottish Edition, cloth, is. 6d. 

Reader, The Temperance. By Rev. J. Dennis Hird. is. 6d. 

Readers, The 44 Modern School" Geographical. {List on application.) 

Readers, The " Modern School." Illustrated. {List on application.) 

Reckoning, Howard's Anglo-American Art of. By C. Frusher 
Howard. Paper covers, is. ; cloth, 2s. New Edition, 5s. 

Round the Empire. By G. R. Parkin. Fully Illustrated, is. 6d. 

Science Applied to Work. By J. A. Bower, is. 

Science of Everyday Life. By J. A. Bower. Illustrated, is. 

Shade from Models, Common Objects, and Casts of Ornament, 
How to. By W. E. Sparkes. With 25 Plates by the Author. 3s. 

Shakspere's Plays for School Use. 5 Books. Illustrated. 6d. each. 

Spelling, A Complete Manual of. By J. D. Morell, LL.D. is. 

Technical Manuals, Cassell's. Illustrated throughout 

Handrailing and Staircasing, 3s. 6d. — Bricklayers, Drawing for, 3s. — 
Building Construction, 2S. — Cabinet-Makers, Drawing for, 3s. — 
Carpenters and Joiners, Drawing for, 3s. 6d. — Gothic Stonework, 3s. — 
Linear Drawing and Practical Geometry, 2s. — Linear Drawing and 
Projection. — The Two Vols, in One, 3s. td. — Machinists and Engineers, 
Drawing for, 4s. 6d. — Metal-Plate Workers, Drawing for, 3s. — Model 
Drawing, 3s. — Orthographical and Isometrical Projection, 2S. — Practical 
Perspective, 3s.— Stonemasons, Drawing for, 3s. — Applied Mechanics, 
by Sir R. S. Ball, LL.D., 2S. — Systematic Drawing and Shading, 2s. 

Technical Educator, Cassell's New. An entirely New Cyclopaedia of 
Technical Education, with Coloured Plates and Engravings. In 
Volumes, 5s. each. 

Technology, Manuals of. Edited by Prof. Ayrton, F.R.S., and 
Richard Wormell, D.Sc, M.A. Illustrated throughout : — 
The Dyeing of Textile Fabrics, by Prof. Hummel, 5s.- Watch and 
Clock Making, by D. Glasgow, Vice-President of the British Horo- 
logical Institute, 4s. 6d. — Steel and Iron, by Prof. W. H. Greenwood, 
F.C.S., M.I.C.E., &c, 5s.— Spinning Woollen and Worsted, by W. S. 
B. McLaren, M. P., 4s. 6d.— Design in Textile Fabrics, by T. R. Ashen- 
hurst, 4s. 6d. — Practical Mechanics, by Prof. Perry, M.E., 3s. 6d. — 
Cutting Tools Worked by Hand and Machine, by Prof. Smith, 3s. 6d. 

Things New and Old ; or, Stories from English History. By 
H. O. Arnold-Forster, M.P. Fully Illustrated, and strongly bound 
in Cloth. Standards I. & II., gd. each; Standard III., is.; 
Standard IV., is. 3d. ; Standards V., VI., & VII., is. 6d. each. 

This World of Ours. By H. O. Arnold-Forster, M.P. Illusd. 3 s. 6d. 



Selections from Cassell § Coinpany's Publications. 



^00ks for |]0Uttg |)i>0ple. 

"Little Folks " Half- Yearly Volume. Containing 432 4to pages, with 
about 200 Illustrations, and Pictures in Colour. Boards, 3s. 6d. ; cloth, 5s. 

Bo-Peep. A Book for the Little Ones. With Original Stories and Verses. 
Illustrated throughout. Yearly Volume. Boards, 2s. 6d. ; cloth, 3s. 6d. 

The Peep of Day. Cassell 's Illustrated Edition. 2s. 6d. 

Maggie Steele's Diary. By E. A. Dillwyn. 2s. 6d. 

A Sunday Story-Book. By Maggie Browne, Sam Browne and Aunt 
Ethel. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 

A Bundle of Tales. By Maggie Browne (Author of "Wanted— a 
King," &c), Sam Browne, and Aunt Ethel. 3s. 6d. 

Fairy Tales in other Lands. By Julia Goddard. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 

Pleasant Work for Busy Fingers. By Maggie Browne. Illustrated. 5s. 

Born a King. By Frances and Mary Arnold-Forster. (The Life of 
Alfonso XIII., the Boy King of Spain.) Illustrated, is. 

Cassell's Pictorial Scrap Book. Six Vols. 3s. 6d. each. 

Schoolroom and Home Theatricals. By Arthur Waugh. Illus- 
trated. 2s. 6d. 

Magic at Home. By Prof. Hoffman. Illustrated. Cloth gilt, 5s. 

Little Mother Bunch. By Mrs. Molesworth. Illustrated. Cloth, 3s. 6d. 

Pictures of School Life and Boyhood. Selected from the best Authors, 
Edited by Percy Fitzgerald, M.A. 2s. 6d. 

Heroes of Every-day Life. By Laura Lane. With about 20 Full- 
page Illustrations. Cloth. 2S. 6d. 

Bob Lovell's Career. By Edward S. Ellis. 5s. 

Books for Young People. Cheap Edition. Illustrated. Cloth gilt, 
3s. 6d. each. 

The Champion of Odin; or, 
Viking Life in the Days of 
Old. By J. Fred. Hodgetts. 

Under Bayard's Banner. By Henry Frith. 
Books for Young People. Illustrated. 3s. 6d. each. 



Bound by a Spell; or, The Hunted 
Witch of the Forest. By the 
Hon. Mrs. Greene. 



*Bashful Fifteen. ByL. T.Meade. 
*The White House at Inch Gow. 

By Mrs. Pitt. 
*A Sweet Girl Graduate. By L. T. 

Meade. 

The King's Command : A Story 
tor Girls. By Maggie Symington. 

Lost in Samoa. A Tale of Adven- 
ture in the Navigator Islands. By 
Edward S. Ellis. 

Tad; or, "Ge ting Even" with 
Him. By Edward S. Ellis. 
*The Palace Beautiful. By L. T. 
Meade. 

* Also procurable in superior binding; 5s. each. 
Crown 8vo Library. Cheap Editions. Gilt edges, 2s. 6d. each. 



*Polly : A New-Fashioned Girl. By 
L. T. Meade. 

"Follow My Leader." By Talbot 
Baines Reed. 
*The Cost of a Mistake. By Sarah 
Pitt. 

*A World of Girls: The Story of 

a School. By L. T. Meade. 
Lost among White Africans. By 

David Ker. 
For Fortune and Glory : A Story of 
the Soudan War. By Lewi* 
Hough. 



Bambles Round London. By C. 

L. Mat^aux. Illustrated. 
Around and About Old England. 

By C. L. Mateaux. Illustrated. 
Paws and Claws. By one of the 

Authors of *' Poems written for a 

Child." Illustrated. 
Decisive Events in History. 

Bv I nomas Archer. With Original 

Illustrations. 
The rrue B,obinson Crusoes. 

Cloth gilt. 
Peeps A broad for Folks at Home. 

Illustrated throughout. 



Wild Adventures i a Wild Places. 
By Dr. Gordon Stable, R.N. Illus- 
trated. 

Moderu Explorers. By Thomas 
Frobt. Iilu:tra ed. New and Cheaper 

Edition. 

Early Explorers. By Thomas Frost. 
Home Chac with oui Young FoLts. 

Illustrated throughout. 
Jungle, Peak, <±±*.a .rlaai. Illustrated 

throughout. 
The Eng. and ol >ha cespe ire. By 

E. Goadby. With Full-page IhW 

trations. 



Selections from Cassell § Company s Publications, 



The "Cross and Crown" Series. Illustrated. 2s.6d. each. 



Freedom's Sword: A Story of the 

Days of Wallace and Bruce. 

By Annie S. Swan. 
Strong to Suffer: A Story of 

the Jews. By E. Wynne. 
Heroes of the Indian Empire; 

or, Stories of Valour and 

Victory. By Ernest Foster. 
In Letters of Flame : A Story 

of the Waldenses. By C. L. 

Mateaux. 



Through Trial to Triumph. - By 

Madeline B. Hunt. 
By Fire and Sword: A Story of 

the Huguenots. By Thomas 

Archer. 

Adam Hepburn's Vow: A Tale of 
Kirk and Covenant. By Annie 
S. Swan. 

No. XIII.; or, The Story of the 
Lost VestaL A Tale of Early 
Christian Days. By Emma Marshall. 



" Golden Mottoes " Series, The. Each Book containing 208 pages, with 
Four full-page Original Illustrations. Crown 8vo, cloth gilt, 2s. each. 



" Nil Desperandum." By the 
Rev. F. Langbridge, M.A. 

"Bear and Forbear." 
Pitt. 

"Foremost if I Can." 

Atteridge. 



By Sarah 
By Helen 



' Honour is my G-uide." By Jeanie 

Henng- (Mrs. Adams-Acton). 
;t Aim at a Sure End." By Emily 

Searchfield. 
'He Conquers who Endures." By 
the Author of "May Cunningham's 
Trial," &c. 

Cassell's Picture Story Books. Each containing about Sixty Pages of 
Pictures and Stories, &c. 6d. each. 
Little Talks. Daisy's Story Book. 
Bright Stars. Dot's Story Book. 
Nursery Toys. A Nest of Stories. 
Pet's Posv. Good-Night Stories. 

Tiny Tales. Chats for Small Chatterers. 



Auntie's Stories. 
Birdie's Story Book. 
Little Chimes. 
A Sheaf of Tales. 
Dewdrop Stories. 



Cassell's Sixpenny Story Books. All Illustrated, and containing 
Interesting Stories by well-known writers. 



The Smuggler's Cave. 
Little Lizzie. 
Little Bird, Life and Adven- 
tures of. 
Luke Barnicott. 



The Boat Club. 
Little Pickles. 

The Elehester College Boys. 
My First Cruise. 
The Little Peacemaker. 



The Delft Jug. 

Cassell's Shilling Story Books. All Illustrated, and containing Interest- 
ing Stories. 



Bunty and the Boys. 
The Heir of Elmdale. 
The Mystery at Shoncliff 
School. 

Claimed at Last, and Boy's 

Beward. 
Thorns and Tangles. 
The Cuckoo in the Bobin's Nest. 
John's Mistake. 
The History of Five Little 

Pitchers. 
Diamonds in the Sana. 



Surly Bob. 
The Giant's Cradle. 
Shag and Doll. 
Aunt Lucia's Locket. 
The Magic Mirror. 
The Cost of Bevenge. 
Clever Frank. 
Among the Bedskins. 
The Ferryman of Brill. 
Harry Maxwell. 
A Banished Monarch. 
Seventeen Cats. 



Illustrated Books for the Little Ones. Containing interesting Stories. 
All Illustrated, is. each ; cloth gilt, is. 6d. 



Tales Told for Sunday. 
Sunday Stories for Small 
People. 

Stories and Pictures for Sun- 
day. 

Bible Pictures for Boys and 

Girls. 
Firelight Stories. 
Sunlight and Shade. 
Bub-a-Dub Tales. 
Fine Feathers and Fluffy Fur. 
Scrambles and Scrapes. 
Tittle Tattle Tales. 
Up and Down the Garden. 



All Sorts of Adventures. 
Our Sunday Stcries. 
Our Holiday Hours. 
Indoors and Out. 
Some Farm Friends. 
Wandering Ways. 
Dumb Friends. 
Those Golden Sands. 
Little Mothers and their 

Children. 
Our Pretty Pets. 
Our Schoolday Hours. 
Creatures Tame. 
Creatures Wild. 



Selections from Cassell % Company's Publications. 



" Wanted— a King " Series. Cheap Edition. Illustrated. 2S. 6d. each. 
Great Grmdmamma. By Georgina M. Synge. 
Robi i's Ride. By Ellinor Davenport Adams. 

Wanted— a King ; or, How Merie set- the Nurs°ry Rhymes to Rights. 
By Mag-gie Browne. With Original Designs by Harry Furniss. 
The World's Workers. A Series of New and Original Volumes. 
With Portraits printed on a tint as Frontispiece, is. each. 



J ohn Cassell. By G. Holden Pike. 
Charles Haddon Spurgeon. By 

G Holden Pike. 
Dr. Arnold of Rugby. By Rose 

E. Selfe. 

The Earl of Shaftesbury. By 
Henry Frith. 

Sarah Robinson, Agnes Wes- 
ton, and Mrs. Meredith. By 

E. M. Tomkinson. 

Thomas A. Edison and Samuel 

F. B. Morse. By Dr. Denslow 
and J. Marsh Parker. 

Mrs. Somerville and Mary Car- 
penter. By Phyllis Browne. 
General Gordon. By the Rev. 

S. A. Swaine. 
Charles Dickens. By his Eldest 

Daughter. 
Sir Titus Salt and George 
Moore. By J. Burnley. 



Florence Nightingale, Catherine 
Marsh, Frances Ridley Haver- 
gal, Mrs. Ranyard (*'L. N. R."j. 
By Lizzie Alldridge. 

Dr. Guthrie, Eather Mathew, 
Elihu Burritt, George Livesey. 
By John W. Kirton, LL.D. 

Sir Henry HavelocK and Colin 
Campbell Lord Clyde. By E. C. 
Phillips. 

Abraham Lincoln. By Ernest Foster. 
Georee MiiLer and Andrew Reed. 

By E. R. Pitman. 
Richard Cobden. By R. Gowing. 
Benjamin Eranklin. By E. M. 

Tomkinson. 
Handel. By Eliza Clarke. TSwaine. 
Turner the Artist. By the Rev. S. A. 
George and Robert Stephenson. 

By C. L. Mateaux. 
David Livingstone. By Robert Smiles. 



The above Works [excluding RICHARD COBDENami CHARLES HADDON 
SPURGEON) can also be had Three in One Vol., cloth, gill edges, 3^. 

Library of Wonders. Illustrated Gift-books for Boys. Paper, is.; 
cloth, is. 6d. 

Wonderful Adventures. I Wonders of Bodily Strength 

Wondertul Escapes. and Skill. 

Cassell 's Eighteenpenny Story Books. Illustrated. 



Wee Willie Winkie. 
Ups ana Downs of a Donkey's 
Life. 

Three Wee Ulster Lassies. 
Up the Ladder. 

Dick's Hero ; and other Stories. 
The Chip Boy. 

Raggles, Baggies, and the 

Emperor. 
Roses from Thorns. 
Gift Books for Young People. 
Original Illustrations in each. 
The Boy Hunters of Kentucky. 

By Edward S.Ellis. 
Red Feather: a Tale of 
American Frontier. 
Edward S. Ellis. 
Seeking a City. 
Rhoda's Reward; or, 
Wishes were Horses." 
Jack Marston's Anchor. 
Frank's Life-Battle ; or, 

Three Friends. 
Fritters. By Sarah Pitt. 
The Two Hardeastles. By Made- 
line Bonavia Hunt. 



the 
By 



' If 



The 



Cassell's Two-Shilling Story Books. Illustrated. 



Faith's Father. 
By Land and Sea. 
The Young Berringtons. 
Jeff and Leff. 
Tom Morris's Error. 
Wortn more than Gold. 
" Through Flood— Through Fire;" 

and other Stories. 
The Girl with the Golden Locks. 
Stories of the Olden Time. 

By Popular Authors. With Four 
Cloth gilt, is. 6d. each. 

Major Monk's Motto. By the Rev. 

F. Lang-bridge. 
Trixy. By Maggie Symington. 
Rags and Rainbows: A Story of 

Thanksgiving. 
Uncle William's Charges; or, The 

Broken Trust. 
Pretty Pink's Purpose; or, The 

Little Street Merchants. 
Tim Thomson's Trial. By George 

Weatherly. 
Ursula's Stumbling-Bloek. By Julia 

Goddard. 

Ruth's Life-Work. By the Rev. 

Joseph Johnson. 



Stories of the Tower. 
Mr. Burke's Nieces. 
May Cunningham's Trial. 
The Top of the Ladder : How to 

Reach it. 
Little Flotsam. 
Madge and Her Friends. 
The Children of the Court. 
Maid Marjory. 
Peggy, and other Tales. 



The Four Cats of the Tippertona. 
Marion's Two Homes. 
Little Folks' Sunday Book. 
Two Fourpenny Bits. 
Poor Nelly. 
Tom Henot. 

Through Peril to Fortune. 
Aunt Tabitha's Waifs. 
In Mischief Again. 



Selectio7is from Cassell <$■ Company's Publications. 



Cheap Editions of Popular Volumes for Young People. Bound in 
cloth, gilt edges, 2S. 6d. each. 

For Queen and King. 
Esther vv esr. 
Tliree Homes. 
Working t Win. 
Perils Afloat and Brigands 
Ashore. 



In Quest of G-old; or, Under 

the Whanga Falls. 
On Board the Esmeralda; or, 

Martin Leigh's Log. 
The Romance of Invention : 

Vignettes from the Annals 

of Industry and Science. 



The "Deerfoot" Series. By Edward S. Ellis. With Four full-page 
Illustrations in each Book. Cloth, bevelled boards, 2s. 6d. each. 

The Hunters of the Ozark. | The Camp in the Mountains. 
The Last War Trail. 

The "Log Cabin " Series. By Edward S. Ellis. With Four Full- 
page Illustrations in each. Crown 8vo, cloth, 2s. 6d. each. 

The Lost Trail. | Camp-Fire and Wigwam. 

Footprints in the Forest. 

The "Great River" Series. By Edward S. Ellis. Illustrated 
Crown 8vo, cloth, bevelled boards, 2s. 6d. each. 

Down the Mississippi. Lost in the Wilds. 

Up the Tapaios; or, Adventures in Brazil. 

The " Boy Pioneer " Series. By Edward S. Ellis. With Four Full- 
page Illustrations in each Book. Crown 8vo, cloth, 2s. 6d. each. 

Ned in the Woods. A Tale of I Ned on the River. A Tale of Indian 
Early Days in the West. River Warfare. 

Ned in the Block House. A Story of Pioneer Life in Kentucky. 

The " World in Pictures." Illustrated throughout. 2s. 6d. each. 



A Ramble Round France. | The Eastern Wonderland (Japan). 

All the Russia s. Glimpses of South America. 

Chats about G-ermany. Round Airica. 

The Land of the Pyramids The Land of Temples (India). 
(Egypt). The Isles of the Pacific. 

Peeps into China. 



Half-Crown Story Books. 

Little Hinges. 
Margaret's Enemy. 
Pen's Perplexities. 
Notable Shipwrecks. 
Wonders of Common Things. 



At the South Pole. 
Books for the Little Ones 



Truth will Out. 

Soldier and Patriot (G-eorge Wash- 
ington). 

The Young Man in the Battle of 
Life. By the Rev. Dr. Landels. 



Bhymes for the Young Folk- 
By William Allingham. Beautifully 
Illustrated. 3s. 6d. 



My Diary. With 12 Coloured Plates 

and 366 Woodcuts. Is. 
The Sunday Scrap Book. With 
Several Hundred Illustrations. Paper 
boards, 3s. 6d. ; cloth, gilt edges, 5s. 
The Old Fairy Tales. With Original 
Illustrations. Boards, Is.; cloth, 
Is. bd. 



The History Scrap Book; With 
nearly 1,000 Engravings. Cloth, 
7s. 6d. 

Albums for Children. 3s. 6d. each 

The Album for Home, School, f Picture Album of All Sorts, 
ana Play. Containing Stories by 
Popular Authors. Illustrated. 
My Own Album of Animals. 
With Full-page Illustrations. 



Full-page Illustrations. 
The Chit-Chat Album. 

throughout 



With 
Illustrated 



Cassell & Company's Complete Catalogue will be sent post 
free on application to 
CASSELL & COMPANY, Limited, Ludgate Hill, London. 



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Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Dec. 2004 

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